Reenvisioning Zoning
Moving on to make zoning work
As it stands now, contemporary zoning laws divvy up land into lots, and then those lots into different uses (commercial, industrial, commercial), ideally, to shield the public from unsafe living conditions. But zoning overrides and loosely-defined categories which aim to maintain the “character of the neighborhood” allow for too many loopholes. As long as the developers gain approval from the city planning commission (state overrides help as well; see: Atlantic Yards Development), considerations of a project’s benefit to a community are pushed to the back-burner.
A somewhat radical solution seems appropriate: a new zoning overlay over the existing map, providing for protection from mass-development across continuously situated lots. It is this distinction, and not the easily overridden or otherwise transgressed “type of use” restrictions, that would truly protect the interests of the community. If a planning proposal requires 400 continuous (or nearly continuous) lots to build (say, a sports arena or set of high-end housing complexes), it can find ways to buy or push out the owners, who in turn push out the tenants, often with city help. But if no lone project was allowed to build across such a large footprint, the issue would never arise.
A learned reader might object, citing “floor area ratio,” “building envelope,” or “bulk” restrictions as having the same effect. For small building projects, they are indeed sufficient. But in large-scale developments, they have often become counter-productive. As the complexity of a project increases, the metrics for these restrictions become unfeasible or otherwise contradict each other. And so, the restrictions are allowed much more flexibility. They become open to negotiation and hypothetical lot-line redrawing, zoning lot mergers, and transfers of development rights (allowing higher stacking than the floor area ratio permits), as the NYC Department of City Planning justifies, “in order to achieve a superior site plan.” And this is where we see simple waivers becoming gross transgressions: there is little control over how much leeway is afforded to achieve that superior site plan. Anyone in New York City knows the Board of Standards and Appeals will approve just about anything. So, the slew of zoning codes cited earlier (of which there are many more) only provided for a false sense of security to the community.
Brooklyn's behemoth.
Indeed, most problematic developments are those which are “behemoths”: rows of high-rise condos, coupled with sporting complexes, parking lots, et al. And our contemporary zoning codes have no teeth against them.
Ultimately, this new overlay could make the ones beneath it redundant in their attempts to “protect” the community or “maintain the community feel.” If the new overlay is adopted and the lower-level ones removed, it would simplify the overall zoning codes, and allow for more “layperson” community engagement in planning issues, which is shockingly low, save for some vociferous (and often single-issue) advocacy groups. (Changing a “R6″ to an “R6B” doesn’t elicit much resistance; currently, the intricate nature of zoning codes functions to keep anyone from caring.)
Application
Increasingly-trendy North Brooklyn has already had some damage done, but is a potential choice to sample this new zoning overlay, especially in addition to its latest rezoning, which could cause a development eruption.
Should this new overlay be applied ubiquitously? This seems counterproductive, as anything more than experimental applications in isolated areas would fail to garner any support. It seems best for the prototypical areas to be located in “high-risk” neighborhoods (ironically, inner-city neighborhoods that are economically faltering). The goal is to have a similar impact as being granted historic neighborhood status, but would be applied to neighborhoods that would have no chance of being awarded such status and are being, or at risk to be, overrun by [upper-]middle- to upper-class housing development projects.
The logistics of coming up with numbers to apply as restrictions would be challenging and admittedly have an inescapable arbitrariness, but this already seems to be the norm with contemporary zoning requirements in the present-day. The previously-cited hypothetical of 400 lots is an extreme example of a neighborhood-demolishing swipe, but perhaps four-lot restrictions, in the right areas, coupled with height restrictions, would offer a strong enough barrier.
Redirecting capital
It is clear that the actual profit for developers would be far less than what they are used to. While the current model provides for maximum profit in short amounts of time, in terms of long-term sustainability, it is fundamentally flawed. Eventually, tomorrow’s developers will not be able to profit like their predecessors. In the light of the Atlantic Yards Project’s failure to mobilize capital in a sluggish economy, we can now forcibly argue that we’ve already passed that line which separates “today” from “tomorrow.”
And so, to fill the vacuum created by the exit of the wielders of large capital, small investors and local neighborhood development corporations (which are flourishing nevertheless) would step in to provide a flow of capital to neighborhoods, proportional to their size and needs, to provide for revitalization and/or rebeautification – from the bottom up.
Further considerations
In this proposal, we see a legal protection which would have the potential to break the cycle that is destroying all too many communities. Is there a utopian, impractical, mindset at work here? It is hard to tell whether or not a revision such as this would be effective. But perhaps with another legal barrier erected to large-scale development, at the very least, it could serve as a de facto turnoff if not a de jure restriction. The results of both are equitable.