Category: rezoning

Density and parking: W.W.J.J.(Jane Jacobs) D.?

View of proposed development from Caswell Road. Image from documents filed with City of Charlotte

I’ve spent the last few days re-reading parts of the writings of Jane Jacobs, in advance of a talk I’m giving Thursday in the NoDa neighborhood (6 p.m. at the Evening Muse, free and open to the public) as well as the 100th anniversary of her birth May 4, 1916. (See an inspiring list of Jane’s 100th events at janes100th.org.)

So when I read about neighborhood opposition — and more significant, opposition from District 1 City Council member Patsy Kinsey — to a proposed development in the Elizabeth neighborhood on the basis of density and a worry about parking, I was primed to consult Jacobs’ writing. WWJJD? What Would Jane Jacobs Do? Spoiler: I think she would be OK with the development but would be more worried about what she called “the self-destruction of diversity.”

Ely Portillo’s article in The Charlotte Observer lays out some of the opposition. The proposal (see the rezoning documents here) is for a 60-foot-high development of 123 apartments, with 15,000 square feet of shops and restaurants, at a triangular corner at East Seventh Street and North Caswell Road.

Portillo quotes neighborhood association member Melanie Sizemore saying that while developers and the neighborhood have worked together they haven’t resolved all the issues. Two big sticking points: density and parking. They’re afraid the number of proposed parking spots isn’t generous enough and will mean congestion in the surrounding neighborhood.

Today, Charlotte Agenda writer Jason Thomas, referring to remarks at Monday’s public hearing, opines that it shows “just how lost our City Council is.” (See “The City Council is making baffling decisions on urban planning.“) Thomas praises it as beautifully
designed and well-thought-out and compares it favorably to other recent apartment projects the council approved, including one right across Seventh Street, that he says are uglier.

But the supposed need for more parking? Listen to Jane Jacobs, a brilliant observer of and thinker about cities: “The destructive effects of automobiles are much less a cause than a symptom of our incompetence at city building,” she wrote in The Death and Life of Great American Cities. This is in the book’s introduction, in which she excoriates planners for cluelessness and for oblivion to reality as they blindly follow theories of how cities should work and ignore evidence that their theories are flawed. “… Planners … do not know what to do with automobiles in cities because they do not know how to plan for workable and vital cities anyhow — with or without automobiles.”

One of those failed planner theories is that density in cities is bad. Jacobs’ book proves the opposite: It’s essential to a healthy, functioning city.  But during the 20th century the “density is bad” theory embedded itself in the minds of well-meaning, “progressive” planners and neighborhood advocates. So did the idea that traffic congestion and lack of parking will kill a neighborhood. Jacobs’ observations showed how that’s another fallacy. In recent decades many planners themselves have abandoned the “density is bad” theory. But it’s clearly foremost in some people’s minds.

(An aside: Jacobs’ assumed that cities would have demolition protection for older buildings and the courage to impose height limits, which are tools used to protect the needed diversity of building age and scale. But demolition protection and height limits are lacking in Charlotte.)

Is Thomas fair to expect all City Council members to be urban designers or planners? That would be nice, but it’s unrealistic. That’s why the city pays a whole department of people to advise them on such matters and to ensure that city ordinances produce the kind of development the city’s plans call for.

Quick quiz:

1. Are the plans what they should be, or are they vague feel-good statements?
2. Do the ordinances produce what the plans call for?

OK, you score 100. The policies set forth in many of the plans are vague (“Protect and enhance the character of existing neighborhoods.”). And the ordinances don’t produce what the plans call for. The city hired consultants (Clarion) who told them so. Three years ago. Moving at a pace that makes glacial melting look rapid, the city is only now starting work on rewriting its zoning ordinance.

Why not, in the interim, apply a few patches for areas that need them? I’m thinking of places facing rapid demand for new buildings, where the old multifamily zoning allows developments that deface the sidewalk experience: South End, Elizabeth and Plaza Midwood for starters. Patches could be some tailored-to-the-area zoning overlays, or they could boost the urban design standards in a few of the zoning categories such as MUDD and TOD.

But back to Jane Jacobs. What was that about the self-destruction of diversity? She noticed that successful, popular neighborhoods with a diverse set of buildings, businesses, homes and uses tended over time to lose that blend:“Self-destruction of diversity is caused by success, not by failure. … The process is a continuation of the same economic processes that led to the success itself.”
As a neighborhood becomes more popular, she wrote, the new development will tend to be whatever is most profitable. That’s how capitalism works. Over time, the neighborhood loses its diversity. “So many people want to live in the locality that it becomes profitable to build, in excessive and devastating quantity (emphasis mine), for those who can pay the most. These are usually childless people, and today they are not simply people who can pay the most in general, but people who can or will pay the most for the smallest space.”

Does that sound familiar?

Protest petitions going the way of buggy whips

If you’ve paid attention to Charlotte planning and zoning matters you know the powerful role that protest petitions have played in stopping rezonings that neighbors oppose. The N.C. legislature is moving rapidly toward eliminating protest petitions.

It’s part of a larger bill that would remove a number of local environmental regulations that are stronger than state regulations. The bill passed the N.C. House on Thursday. (“Bill eliminates protest-petition rights in zoning cases“) It now goes back to the N.C. Senate, which passed it without the protest petition section.

Here’s a synopsis of the action, from the blog of Charlotte’s Real Estate and Building Industry Coalition. It notes how many local legislators in both parties voted for the bill, which would, among other things, scrap a key local storm-water pollution ordinance. “House passes landmark regulatory reform package.”

The protest petition is a 90-year-old section of state law that has let adjoining property owners file official protests against proposed rezonings. If enough of these protests are deemed valid, then that rezoning can’t pass without a three-quarters vote from the elected body which in Charlotte is the City Council. In development-happy Charlotte, the provision occasionally means the defeat of rezonings that would otherwise pass, although the council OKs the overwhelming majority of proposed rezonings.

Here’s an editorial from the Greensboro News & Record about the bill: http://www.news-record.com/opinion/n_and_r_editorials/article_41619342-ea81-11e2-b870-0019bb30f31a.html

The editorial says: “… There was no chance for compromise, just a wholesale repeal with little warning.

“In principle, the action contradicts what the Republican legislature has done in regard to involuntary annexations. It has empowered affected residents to call for a referendum. This measure takes power from residents.

“But some developers don’t like protest petitions because it’s harder for them to advance projects that neighbors don’t want. They’re “costly and hinder development,” Rep. Rob Bryan, R-Mecklenburg, said Thursday.”

It’s part of a bill that state planners are calling the “Billboards Forever” bill. Read this report from The Charlotte Observer’s Jim Morrill: http://campaigntracker.blogspot.com/2013/07/surprises-not-surpising-near-sessions.html

Ballantyne ‘affordable housing’? It was there at the start

It turns out that affordable housing – a better term is “below market-rate housing” – was required to be built in Ballantyne as part of its rezoning request, which county commissioners approved in November 1991. This was more than just a verbal agreement from developer Johnny Harris. It was part of the legally enforceable zoning agreement. And the housing was built. (This relates to Tommy Tomlinson’s column today, “Is public housing Ballantyne’s IOU?”, in which he notes that we taxpayers spent millions to create the highways that allowed Ballantyne to prosper.)

Planning consultant Walter Fields, who for many years was land development manager for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg planning staff, worked with the Harris family over a period of years, starting in the 1980s, about their development plans for what used to be called “The South Farm,” a beautiful tract that was part of late Gov. Cameron Morrison’s vast property holdings.

“There was definitely something in there [the rezoning agreement] and they definitely did it,” he told me. He recalled it was small-lot, single family housing. And he pointed out one problem with those sorts of “affordable housing” provisions: Unless other mechanisms are in place the housing is below-market rate when it’s first sold, but after than it sells for whatever anyone can sell it for. Which is why, let me note, there’s still a need for below-market rate housing in the area.

Today, Ballantyne is awash with apartments, which Fields points out are another form of “affordable housing.” He was approached, he says, by a lot of people for help in fighting the now-dropped proposal for subsidized apartments at Providence Road West and Johnston Road. “I turned them all down,” he says. As a consultant he often advocates for multifamily.

And, he recalls, during negotiations with the city-county planning department over Ballantyne the planners were continually pushing the importance of a mix of housing types at Ballantyne.

But the project was controversial, not least because that was in the era when Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools was really trying to integrate its schools, because it was legally required to, part of a court order in effect. (Today, schools in the Ballantyne area are far less integrated than in much of the rest of the county; Hawk Ridge Elementary is 10 percent black; Community House Middle and Ardrey Kell High are 12 percent black.) Some school board members weren’t happy about the prospect of a vast sea of white kids that they’d be required to bus long distances – or, conversely, having to bus another sea of nonwhite kids long distances. Of course, that problem got solved by the dissolving of the court order to integrate …

This is from an article in October 1991, by the Observer’s Liz Chandler:
“Louise Woods [who later served on the school board], representing a citizens group, urged commissioners to make Harris detail how many low- and moderate-income homes he will build.
“We request that the Ballantyne proposal include a section of affordable moderate- and low-income housing,” Woods said in a letter signed by seven others.
Woods also said school and county officials should scrutinize Harris’ plans to ensure Ballantyne is an integrated community. Neighboring subdivisions are predominantly white. The group is concerned about what they see is a trend resulting in long bus rides for black students brought in to achieve integration.”

Helicopter guy rebuffed on rezoning

Quick update on the council action, regarding the proposed solar-energy building on Park Road, whose developer would be the fellow in the much-loved “rogue helicopter” video.

The council members set a new land speed record in turning it down 12-0. Because there was a protest petition in force by adjoining property owners, even the mayor got to help vote it down.

See the post below, or click here, for more information and the video.

Protest petitions strangle development?

Ahem, someone needs to get out more. Up in Greensboro, there’s a discussion over whether the city should no longer be exempt from the law that allows protest petitions against proposed rezonings. The city council is to vote on Wednesday whether to ask the legislature to lift its exemption, so its citizens can file protest petitions as in most other N.C. cities.

One argument being raised against protest petitions is that they would strangle development. Whoever is saying this clearly has not been to Charlotte, where (until the recession slowed everything) it was quite clear that development here has been anything but strangled.

(What’s a protest petition? When a rezoning is proposed, if enough adjoining property owners sign a protest petition, then the deciding body, e.g. Charlotte City Council, must pass the rezoning by a three-fourths vote. And the mayor gets to vote on protest-petition rezonings, unlike other rezonings.)