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Growth Policy PlanFlathead Regional Development Office 723 5th Avenue East - Room 414 Kalispell, Montana 59901 Phone: (406) 758-5980 Fax: (406) 758-5781 REPORT TO: Kalispell City County Planning Board Kalispell Mayor and City Council FROM: Narda A. Wilson, Senior Planner SUBJECT Urban Growth Boundary / Urban Service Boundary MEETING DATE: October 17, 2000 Planning Board Work Session October 23, 2000 City Council Work Session BACKGROUND: At a work session on September 25, 2000, the Kalispell City Council discussed how the issues that related to the growth policy plan would be addressed. , It was generally decided at that meeting that the first issue for consideration would be the concept of an urban growth boundary. The staff was directed to gather some information regarding urban growth boundaries and provide that to the planning board and the city council for their review and consideration. Attached to this memo are some articles growth boundaries. There is also some service boundary," and how the two differ. and other information dealing with urban information on the concept of an "urban It would be the opinion of the staff that an urban growth boundary would not find the needed political support from either the public or the elected officials and has the potential to create unintended consequences such as inflated land prices inside the boundary and endless conflicts at the fringes where those on the outside want in. Additionally, there could be problems with inflexible standards outside of the boundary where larger lot zoning may not be responsive to market needs. On, the other hand, an urban service boundary may be a more practical tool for predicting where urban infrastructure would be anticipated to be extended. This would require a high level of cooperation between the City and County governments to insure that lands within the urban service area be developed in accordance with "urban standards," i.e. paving, curb, gutter, sidewalks and lighting, to reflect the urban scale of development. The urban service boundary would be based upon the concept that services would be provided by an entity in the area, i.e. a city or public utility provider, such as Evergreen Water and Sewer District, and that potentially this area would become part of an incorporated city. The urban service boundary would be based upon a practical assessment of the potential for the delivery of services, available infrastructure and cost effective developments. RECOMMENDATION: Consider the concepts of an urban growth boundary and / or an urban service area and whether or not either of the concepts would be a good fit for the Kalispell planning jurisdiction. H\... \KCCMP\UPDATE\2000\UGBMEMO.DOC Providing Community Planning Assistance To: • Flathead County • City of Columbia Falls • City of Kalispell • City of Whitefish • Flathead Regional Development Office 723 Sth Avenue East - Room 414 Kalispell, Montana S9901 Phone: (406) 758-5980 Fax: (406) 7WS781 October 18, 2000 Chris Kukulski, City Manager City of Kalispell P.O. Box 1997 Kalispell, MT 59903 Re: Urban Growth Boundary / Urban Service Boundary Dear Chris: The Kalispell City -County Planning Board held a special work session on Tuesday, October 17, 2000 to consider the concept of an urban growth boundary as part of the Kalispell City County Growth Policy Plan at the request of the Kalispell City Council. Seven of the nine planning board members were present at the work session. At the city council's September 25, 2000 work session the staff was directed to gather some information regarding urban growth boundaries and provide it to the planning board and the city council for their review and consideration. We reviewed that information prior to the planning board meeting and discussed the various aspects of creating an urban growth boundary within the Kalispell planning jurisdiction. There was discussion at the meeting of what an urban growth boundary is intended to accomplish and the concept of an "urban service boundary," and how the two differ. Providing incentives to locate inside of an urban growth area such as the extension of services by the City, tax abatements or financial assistance to encourage growth to occur within areas planned for growth was considered preferable to restrictions. The board perceived problems with establishing an urban growth boundary particularly with the potential unintended consequences. Affordable housing could be made less affordable because the land prices inside the urban growth boundary could rise as a result of being inside the boundary area. The potential higher land prices inside the urban growth boundary could actually contribute to sprawl because people will look elsewhere for less expensive land in the rural areas of the county that are largely unregulated. Also, land prices rise inside the urban growth boundary so would taxes which can have a big impact on people with lower or fixed incomes. Furthermore, land inside the urban growth boundary planned for urban development may belong to someone who doesn't want to develop it in the manner it was planned by someone else. An urban service area or boundary was also discussed. It was generally agreed by the board that an extension of services boundary in the Kalispell Extension of Services Plan would in effect provide a service boundary. The board felt that an urban service boundary as part of the growth policy plan would in effect turn into an urban growth boundary. At this juncture, the Kalispell City County Planning Board would recommend against establishing an urban growth boundary or an urban service area for the Kalispell City -County Growth Policy Plan for the reasons outlined above. Providing Community Planning Assistance To: • Flathead County • City of Columbia Falls • City of Kalispell • City of Whitefish • Urban Growth Boundary from KPB to CC October 18, 2000 i Page 2 You may contact this board or Narda Wilson at the Flathead Regional Development Office if you have any questions regarding this matter. Sincerely, spell Cou Planning Board Jean A. J son JJ/NW H: \... \MSTRPLN \KCCMP\UPDATE\2000\URBSTRANMrr. DOC What is an Urban Growth Boundary? Page 1 of 3 What is an Urban Growth Boundary? Facts About an Important Land -Use Planning Tool in Oregon's Statewide Planning Program Each of Oregon's 241 cities is surrounded by an "urban growth boundary" or "UGB." The UGB is line drawn on planning and zoning maps to show where a city expects to grow. The diagram below shows a typical situation. The heavy line is the UGB. The narrow line shows the current city limits. The hatched area between the UGB and the city Limits is "urbanizable land" -- undeveloped land that will accommodate the city's future growth. Eventually, the "urbanizable area' will be developed. Urban services like sewers and streets will 2 be installed. The area probably will be annexed to the city. And urban development -- new subdivisions, apartments, office buildings, and stores -- will spring up there. Land outside the UGB will remain rural. Urban services like sewers won't be extended there, and the zoning will prohibit urban development and the creation of small new lots. Most of the land outside the urban growth boundary will continue to be used for farming, forestry, or low -density residential development. Who draws the UGB? Drawing an urban growth boundary is a joint effort. Of course the city that will be surrounded by the boundary plays a key role, but there are other important participants. The adjoining county plays a vital part because. it is responsible for planning and zoning in the area outside the city limits. Special districts participate because they provide important services such as fire protection and water in the urbanizable area. Citizens of the area and other interested people and groups also help to determine where the UGB will be drawn. After local governments draw a UGB, the state's Land Conservation and Development Commission reviews it to make sure it is consistent with Goal 14. What is Goal 14? Goal 14, Urbanization, is the statewide planning goal that deals with urban growth. It was adopted by LCDC on December 27, 1974. Goal 14 requires each city to adopt a UGB, "in a cooperative process between a city and the county or counties that surround it." The goal also lists seven "factors" that must be considered in drawing the UGB. The first two factors deal with the question of how much land should be brought into the urban growth boundary. They are known as the "need factors." The remaining five factors (known as the "locational factors") have to do with where the boundary should be placed. 27/09/00 What is an Urban Growth Boundary? Page 2 of 3 How much land is needed in the UGB? The amount of land to be included in the UGB depends on how much the city is expected to grow. City officials estimate growth by making population projections or by using projections already done by some state or regional agency. The city's projections must be consistent with those of other local governments in the area. Next, the city decides how much vacant land is likely to be needed to accommodate the expected growth. Community leaders, planners, and citizens estimate how many acres will be needed for the new houses, offices, stores, factories, and parks that will serve the future population. Suppose, for example, that a city's population is projected to increase by 1,000 people. The city planners then calculate "housing mix" (the distribution of those new people among houses, apartments, and mobile homes). They estimate what the vacancy rates, household sizes, and densities of development will be. Using such information, the planners can predict how much land will be needed for the housing and development to serve 1,000 people. After they decide how many acres of vacant land will be needed to accommodate future growth, the planners subtract the amount of vacant land that is already available within the current city limits. The remainder is the amount of urbanizable land beyond city limits that is needed for future growth. Communities with large areas of vacant land already inside their city limits or that do not expect much growth establish their UGBs close to the current city limits. In fact, some cities have made their UGBs congruent with their city limits. Cities with little vacant land and high growth rates draw their UGBs farther from the city limits, thus creating large areas of urbanizable land. How is the location of the UGB decided? Once the amount of land to be included in the UGB has been determined, the city and the adjoining county must decide which areas should be put inside the boundary. In making that decision, they use Goal 14's "locational factors." The locational factors focus on three main issues: efficient use of land, protection of agricultural land at the city's edge, and cost-effective public services. For example, Factor 3 calls for "orderly and economic provision of public facilities and services." That standard suggests that a rugged, hilly area which would be costly to serve with sewers, water, and streets should not be included in the UGB. What is an urban growth management agreement? A UGB typically creates an urban growth area that encircles the city. Land in that area is not within the city's corporate limits: it is under county jurisdiction. But since much of that land may be annexed to the city someday, it is important for the city and county to work together in planning and zoning that area. Usually, the urban growth area is subject to the city's comprehensive plan, but the county controls zoning and land use permits there until the area is annexed or becomes developed to urban standards. Cities and counties coordinate planning and zoning in urban growth areas through "urban growth management agreements." Such agreements provide the answers to important questions like these: Which local government will administer land -use regulations in the urban growth area? How should the growth area be zoned until it gees urbanized? What standards for public services and 27/09/00 What is an Urban Growth Boundary? Page 3 of 3 facilities should be applied there? What interim controls should be used to protect the growth area's potential for urban development? Interim controls are necessary to prevent haphazard, premature development. Without them, the "urbanizable land" might soon become unsuitable for urban use. Can a boundary be enlarged? Urban growth boundaries can be modified. In the four years from 1987 through 1990, for example, 52 proposals to expand UGBs were approved in Oregon. To amend its UGB, a city must comply with the "exception" requirements from Statewide Planning Goal 2 and apply Goal 14's standards for establishing an urban growth boundary. The requirements from Goal 2 call for a review of alternatives. Basically, they ask the question "Is this the best place to expand (or contract) the UGB?" Do UGBs work? Oregon's 15 years of experience have shown urban growth boundaries to be highly effective. UGBs have helped to hold down the costs of public services and facilities. They have saved a great deal of farmland from urban sprawl. They have led to better coordination of city and county land -use planning. And they have brought greater certainty for those who own, use, or invest in land at the city's edge. Prepared by Oregon's Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD) 1175 Court Street NE, Salem, Oregon 97310 Telephone 503 373-0050 January 1992 Revised 5/10/95 HTML formatting by Jeanne Kowalewski 27/09/00 URBAN RENEWAL URBAN RUNOFF URBAN SERVICE BOUNDARY USE USE, ACCESSORY USE, CONDITIONAL USE, EXISTING USE, INHERENTLY BENEFICIAL USE, INSTITUTIONAL USE, PERMITTED USE, PRINCIPAL USE, RELIGIOUS USE, TEMPORARY USE, TRANSITIONAL USE VARIANCE USER CHARGES A program for the physical improvement of primarily urban areas through comprehensive planning and govern- mental assistance to effect rehabilitation and redevelop- ment. Stormwater from city streets, gutters, and paved sur- faces. Comment: Urban runoff usually contains a great deal of litter and organic and bacterial wastes. See RUNOFF. A defined region, not always coincidental with a munici- pality's corporate boundary, that defines the geographi- cal limit of government -supplied public facilities and services. The purpose or activity for which land or buildings are designed, arranged, or intended or for which land or buildings are occupied or maintained. See ACCESSORY USE. See CONDITIONAL USE. See EXISTING USE. See INHERENTLY BENEFICIAL USES. See INSTITUTIONAL USE. See PERMITTED USE. See PRINCIPAL USE. See RELIGIOUS USE. See TEMPORARY USE. See TRANSITIONAL USE. See VARIANCE, USE. A requirement of government under which those that benefit directly from a particular service pay all or part of the cost. 289 Re-gional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Urban Boundaries Page 1 of 2 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Urban Boundaries Urban Boundaries Action Step 5A The Metropolitan Council designates the urban reserve boundary shown on the Growth Strategy Map on as the maximum long term service area for regional services between now and 2040. Communities inside the boundary are either in the urban area or in an urban reserve area that will eventually become developed. Land outside the 2040 urban reserve boundary will remain permanently rural or permanently agricultural. Partnership Actions The Council will work with local governments to establish land use plans and practices to ensure a 40+ year life expectancy for the urban reserve. The Council has based the urban reserve boundary on watersheds. It has been sized to provide a 40+ year supply of land for future urbanization beyond the current 2000 metropolitan urban service area based on the forecasts included in this document. The forecasts reflect long run, historic land use mixes and densities and are higher densities than recent short run trends. Council forecasts reflect growth management policies supporting better use of land and public investments; specifically supporting redevelopment of obsolete land uses, reuse and renovation of existing structures, infill on skipped over and hard -to -develop sites, adding new housing units that reflect demographic changes, support job centers and meet the life cycle housing needs of individuals and families. In addition, the forecasts also reflect anticipated demographic changes, namely aging of the large baby -boom generation. This will probably reduce the demand for large -lot single family housing, which has been extremely strong in the past 10 years, a period when baby -boomers were in the peak years for family formation. These anticipated demographic changes will not really be very strong until after the turn of the century, however. To achieve higher densities and slow the outward spread of the region for the near -term will require a joint effort of the Council and cities to support a broader range of housing types, infill and redevelopment. The Council forecasts reflect such activities in a general way. The specific ways this will accomplished will need to be worked out for each city through its comprehensive planning process. These forecast will serve as an initial target to challenge cities in the MUSA to accommodate more development, but they will need to be refined to reflect the individual factors affecting land use and development in each community. Figure 7 Regional Growth Strategy Policy Areas, December 1996 Urban Care Urban Area RUstrative 2C ® Urban Roser :. Rurai Gfowie SM Permanent A WM Permanent P /V http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro4a.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Regional Services Within The Urban Area Page 1 of 2 ices Within The Urban Regional Services Within The Urban Area Action Step 5B The Council will provide regional services for urban -scale development only within the urban area consistent with staged local comprehensive plans and metropolitan system plans. The Council will work with local units of government to establish the location and staging of metropolitan urban services. Council actions: Ensure there is sufficient developable and/or redevelopable land in all parts of the urban area to: • Meet regional demand for economic development. • Meet future demand for life -cycle and affordable housing opportunities. • Reserve reasonable amounts of land for anticipated commercial -industrial development and redevelopment. • Prevent an artificial increase of land prices. • Discourage leapfrog urban development into the rural service area or adjacent counties. 2. Develop models indicating how local governments can meet the staging requirements in the Land Planning Act in ways that are consistent with regional goals and plans. 3. Focus regional investments, services and incentives on job and economic development activities inside the urban area, specifically within and around the 1-494/1-694 freeway beltway, with particular emphasis on the urban core and the nodes and corridors connected to it. • Target redevelopment incentive funds to projects that increase the number of living wage jobs in/near areas of concentrated poverty and that demonstrate linkages with local residents. • Give additional preference to redevelopment projects that make more efficient use of currently underutilized public service capacity (e.g., roads and highways, transit, wastewater, utilities, telecommunications infrastructure, etc.). 4. Assist all communities in setting housing density benchmarks to make the 2040 Urban Reserve last at least 40+ years. 5. Assist local communities to develop and implement land use practices, controls and urban design that promote concentration of jobs and economic activity and achieve agreed upon housing density benchmarks. Partnership actions: 6. Work with Minneapolis and St. Paul to coordinate and streamline planning, development, redevelopment and service delivery to effectively address issues of job creation, economic development and neighborhood vitality. 7. Explore with the school districts in Minneapolis and St. Paul ways to work together on issues affecting neighborhood vitality, job creation and economic development. 1 PliEVI US INDEXv � �r � ►� http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro4b.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Urban Staging Areas Page 1 of 2 Areas Urban Staging Areas Action Step 5C The Council will work with communities along the current 2000 MUSA line to plan for cost effective, staged, contiguous 2020 urban staging areas as part of the urban area. Council actions: 1. Establish by the end of 1998 comprehensive plan review agreements with local jurisdictions for staged 2020 growth plans which: • Identify which parts of the urban reserve are planned to urbanize before 2020. • Establish local actions leading to more efficient land use patterns, including densities higher than recent trends and mixed, connected land uses. • Integrate regional and local plans for highways, parks, schools, local sewers and other investments. • Ensure housing is available in a variety of types and prices for current and future residents of the community. • Preserve environmental resources. • Maintain agricultural land and support the Council's rural area policy. 2. Use local geographic information system (GIS) generated data where available and consistent with regional guidelines in reviewing local comprehensive plans and proposed urban service area changes. The Council will improve its own GIS capability to further this process, and regularly share, review, and update its land use information to improve its quality. In the interim, the Council will continue to verify land use using the best available information and data. By agreeing to 2020 staging areas in comprehensive plan reviews, the Council makes a commitment to provide regional services to that area. In addition, the local government makes a commitment to provide local services to that area. To minimize public expenditures for these services and to ensure orderly and economic development of the region, the addition of new land to the 2000 MUSA boundary should be timed and staged in an orderly manner. When a local government proposes a 2020 staging area in its comprehensive plan, by either adding more land to its urban service area or changing the urban service area boundaries, the Council will use the following performance guidelines to ensure that orderly and contiguous development occurs: a. The Council will support local comprehensive planning that carefully stages development. In comprehensive plans local government must analyze how proposed staging will affect regional forecasts, system plans and operations. Because this analysis is most effectively accomplished when changes are considered in aggregate, the Council prefers that a local government include 2020 staging areas in the plan due by 1998. b. Based on the currently established year 2000 MUSA boundary, initial locally defined 2020 staging areas will be limited to those communities already receiving some service. The Council will reevaluate the need to add staging areas in other communities after it has received and reviewed all local comprehensive plans due by the end of 1998. c. 2020 staging areas will be allowed only where appropriate and sufficient regional wastewater treatment and transportation capacity exists or is planned to coincide with the requested expansion. Redevelopment potential within each sector will also be considered when reviewing expansion requests. In those cases where a regional http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro4c.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Urban Staging Areas Page 2 of 2 system bottleneck or capacity constraint exists, the Council will work with local governments to find an acceptable solution. d. Assist communities to implement higher -density development along specific transportation corridors by: • integrating local activities into plans from the beginning of transit project development. • identifying underutilized lands and other opportunities for increased -density development and redevelopment along transportation corridors. • ensuring adoption of land use policies, urban design practices and zoning controls to support transit - and pedestrian -oriented development, including higher density and mixed -use development. • promoting travel demand management activities with employers and developers. e. Local government's comprehensive plans will be the usual method of reflecting agreements between the Council and the local government for the provision of regional urban services or urban staging areas. However, in some cases, because of unusual circumstances or issues, it may be more appropriate for the Council and the local government to develop a special agreement or compact outlining their respective roles, responsibilities and commitments regarding a service or urban staging area timing or phasing. For example, special agreements have been developed with the cities of Eden Prairie and Shakopee. Agreements/compacts will be tied to performance through local comprehensive plans. The Council will review progress toward implementation of the agreement in future decisions involving the community. ..._ u�� 1tiClUS' --I-- _V INDEX_ NEXT ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS 1 METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE 0 IOU M enepolten Gourd. All Ai&te Reserved. Content msinbined by the Ustrwotkan CoundL http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro4c.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Urban Reserve Page 1 of 1 Urban Reserve Action Step 5D The Council will work with local communities not currently receiving regional sewer service but in the urban reserve to plan and implement a post 2020 holding zone for future urban service and development. Council actions: 1. The Council considers areas in the post 2020 part of the urban reserve as temporarily rural. In reviewing local comprehensive plans the Council will use the following performance standards: • Residential densities should be no more than one unit per 40 acres. • Land uses and development patterns should be consistent with a rural lifestyle (see Appendix B for examples). • Overlay -ghost platting should be required of any large lot development and tied to a capital improvement program. 2. In reviewing local plans, provision for residential densities greater than one unit per 40 acres is acceptable if the development will be clustered. Such clusters will be considered temporary until full urbanization occurs around them. Local plans and ordinances will need to require that the temporary clusters be connected to central sewer and other city services when they become available and that the temporary clusters be designed and laid out in accordance with local subdivision regulations, including dedication of future utility and infrastructure easements. 3. Annually monitor land use consumption, wastewater treatment system use and traffic counts and assess at least every 3-5 years the need for services and urban service area changestexpansions. Reexamine the boundaries of the urban service area each time the Council adopts new forecasts of population, households and employment. The Council does not expect that development will occur evenly across the region. The Council needs to better ensure that developing communities have adequate land for new development and also to better recognize the potential for redevelopment and reinvestment. PREVIOUS INDEX NEXT _V .. . ....... ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS I METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE 0 10W Metrgw1tan € Guneg. All lets Reserved. Content maintained by the MabWolkan CoundL http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro4d.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - The Rural Area Page 1 of 1 t The Rural Area Action Step 5E The Council will support three land use types outside the metropolitan urban reserve boundary: permanent agricultural area, permanent rural area and rural growth centers. The permanent agricultural area includes "agricultural preserve" land under the Metropolitan Agricultural Presences Act that is certified by the local government as eligible for the agricultural preserves program. In permanent agricultural areas, the Council will support a density of no more than one housing unit per 40 acres. The permanent rural area is land outside the urban reserve boundary that has a wide variety of land uses, including farms, very low - density residential development and facilities that mainly serve urban residents, such as regional parks. Regional facilities and services should not be extended into this area to serve high -density development like that found in the urban area. Only development that protects the rural character of the permanent rural area and that will not require urban services should be permitted. The rural growth centers are small cities that have central sewer service systems. Although located in permanent agricultural and rural areas they are now home to many residents who work in the urban area and many industries with few ties to agriculture. These cities should pace development with their ability to provide local urban services. A balance of housing and jobs to promote self-sufficiency is encouraged. Local plans should also include 2020 urban staging areas, through orderly annexation agreements with adjoining townships where necessary. Many facilities exist in the rural area that serve the urban or entire metropolitan area public. These facilities include campgrounds, regional parks, solid waste management facilities, gun clubs, festivals, mining sites and similar facilities. These facilities should be provided with adequate public services, consistent with local and regional plans, and to the extent possible, should not interfere with agricultural activities. INDEX NEXT _ � ►� ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS I METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE 0 IM LietmpAtan council. All lets Reserved. content maintained by the UsOWWhan 0ounciL , http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro5.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Permanent Agricultural Area Page 1 of 1 riculturai Area Permanent Agricultural Area Permanent Agriculture Area --One of the region's prime natural resources is its productive agricultural soils. The current Metropolitan Agricultural Preserves program emphasizes protecting lands that are planned and zoned for long-term agriculture use and enrolled under an eight -year covenant with the land owner. Productivity of the soils should be a consideration in the Council's protection of farmland. A common misconception is that agriculture and other rural land uses are only temporary, waiting for the land to be developed. Most of the rural area will not be needed for urban development in the foreseeable future. Agriculture and rural land uses are legitimate and permanent land uses in these areas. Council actions: 1 . The Council will support agriculture as the primary long-term land use in the permanent agricultural area. The Council will use the priorities below in protecting those prime agriculture lands most capable of supporting long-term agriculture production. Partnership actions: 2. The Council will convene a task force of farmers, local officials, and agricultural experts (the counties, University of Minnesota Extension, Minnesota Department of Agriculture, Minnesota Environmental Quality Board) to recommend how to define the permanent agricultural area consistent with Land Evaluation -Site Assessment principles and appropriate tools necessary to keep it in agricultural use. The Council will amend its agricultural criteria, maps, and action steps based on task force recommendations and will incorporate the recommendations into the Council's Local Planning Handbook. In the interim, the Council will use the following ranking in decisions affecting prime agricultural land: a. Land covenanted in agriculture preserves will receive primary protection. Urban facilities should be prohibited in this area unless there is strong documentation that no other locations in the Metropolitan Area can adequately meet the siting and selection criteria. b. Land certified but not presently in agricultural preserves will receive a level of protection second to agricultural preserves. Urban facilities should not be located in this area unless there is strong evidence that a proposed urban use cannot be located in the general rural use area. c. Land with Class I, 11, 111 and irrigated Class IV soils will receive a third level of protection. ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS I METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE 6 IOU RtetropoGten Council. All Rights Reserved. Content maintained by the Mefvpoiitsn Council. http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro5a.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Permanent Rural Area Page 1 of 2 ral Area Permanent Rural Area Council actions: 3. The Council will not support extensive development in the permanent rural area. Appropriate rural land uses must meet all environmental quality standards, not require urban -level support services, be of a scale to serve local market demands and preserve open space. In local plan reviews and other activities the Council will use the following performance standards: A. An overall, gross density up to one dwelling unit per 10 acres. An upper rural -urban threshold up to one unit per 10 acres overall gross density is consistent with maintaining rural lifestyle and character and is consistent with planned transportation system capacities in this part of the region. This standard should not be construed as a recommendation of 10 acre lot sizes. In fact, lower densities and bigger lot sizes that mix farm and nonfarm uses would be even more in keeping with rural lifestyle and character, and are preferred. Once a community approaches and exceeds a threshold of one unit per 10 acre gross density (for a 36 square mile township this is about 2,300 housing units and 7,150 people) it is changing from a rural place to more of a suburban place. The one per 10 standard is applicable to areas where it is still feasible; (Appendix C lists communities with areas previously exempted from such rural area standards.) a. Clustered development. There is a portion of the region's populace interested in rural and small town living. As a result, development will continue in the permanent rural area. To the extent it is permitted by local government, development should be clustered rather than occur on scattered, large lot subdivisions. Cluster designs as allowed in Washington County, for example, offer several advantages. In reviewing local plans the Council will evaluate proposals for cluster developments meeting the following performance standards: permanent protection of open space and common areas, design treatment that maintains a definite rural area visual appearance, permanent protection of natural resources and amenities, design and management of on - site or communal sewer systems that will function indefinitely, traffic generation consistent with rural levels of service, and permanent agricultural areas and urban expansion areas around rural growth centers are not preempted. b. Planned and designed to not need urban services. The Council does not plan to provide urban -level services, such as regional sewers or transportation facilities with urban service levels, to areas outside the urban reserve boundary before 2040, if ever. Communities and developments in the permanent rural area will be expected to pay the full cost of any required urban services should they be necessary before 2040. 4. Revise regional wastewater treatment and transportation policy plans to recognize that cumulative negative impacts of small-scale development may have a substantial impact on or constitute a substantial departure from these plans. Partnership actions: 5. Develop any needed refinements or guidelines for appropriate rural area land use policy implementation by working with the counties, local communities, University of Minnesota Extension, Minnesota Department of Agriculture, Minnesota Environmental Quality Board among others. Incorporate such implementation tools in the Council's Local Planning Handbook. http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro5b.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Rural Growth Centers Page 1 of 1 enters Rural Growth Centers These historically served as trade centers for the surrounding rural area. However, with changes in agriculture and rapid urban expansion, many have become residential areas for people who work in urban and suburban cities, and locations for industries with little tie to local agriculture. While some rural centers have metropolitan transportation and sewer service, the Council does not support the extension of regional systems to rural centers because of the distance from the urban center and the small populations of rural centers. However, upon local request the Council will consider operation and ownership of treatment plants serving rural growth centers (see policies and guidelines in Water Resource Management Policy Plan). Rural growth centers can accommodate some additional development, provided that they can locally finance and administer services, including schools, sewer, roads, water and stormwater drainage. These small cities are expected to plan for a balance of housing and jobs to promote self-sufficiency and for 2020 urban staging areas. Planned development and its staging need to be consistent with the local comprehensive plan and the Council's urban and rural area policies and forecasts. If additional land is needed to accommodate growth, rural growth centers should extend services in a staged, contiguous manner. Orderly annexation agreements with adjoining townships are preferred, but municipal joint powers or service agreements are acceptable. Residential, commercial and industrial development at urban densities should be accommodated only in rural growth centers with central sanitary sewers that are meeting state and federal water quality standards. I, - 0, "_ — - - , - - , - , - — - - - - - - , , . . PREVIOUS_ INDEhCm.___ NEi67 ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS I METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE O It" t strapoHtan Council. All bights Reserved, Content maintained by the tlletrwotitan Counal, http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro5c.htm 10/3/00 Regional Blueprint: Regional Growth Strategy - Permanent Rural Area Page 1 of 1 ral Area Permanent Rural Area To presence the rural character of the area and minimize the demand for local services, development should occur at very low densities and should minimize conflicts with those who depend on agriculture for all or part of their livelihood. People then can still enjoy a rural lifestyle, with a home "in the country" near nature and away from urban life. Residential subdivisions, mobile home parks and clusters of moderate -density residential development exist in the rural area. While urban -type services may be expected in these areas, their locations make these services difficult or costly to provide. A substantial amount of development in the rural service area can lead to premature and costly demands to extend regional services like sewers and expand facilities like highways, and does not take advantage of regional investments that have been made in the urban service area. Local governments can maintain low densities in several ways. The Council encourages grouping residential units in ways that keep a substantial amount of the parcel in open land. This practice can help preserve natural features like wetlands, lakes, and wildlife areas or help avoid soils or topography that are not suitable for housing units with on -site sewage disposal systems. The Council also encourages local governments to use performance standards (for example, suitability of soils for an on -site system) to determine appropriate lot sizes for rural areas, rather than to rely on a uniform minimum lot size. ........... ._ _____. ° PREVIOUS INDEX NEXT f ABOUT METRO COUNCIL I MEETINGS & AGENDAS I METRO AREA INFO PLANNING I HOUSING ASSISTANCE I ENVIRONMENT PUBLIC TRANSIT I REGIONAL PARKS I FIND IT I HOME PAGE 0 Ifift Mebopollt a Owmcif. All Ri" Reserved. Contewd mairtsined by the i sUWaihan CoundL http://www.metrocouncil.org/planning/rbpgro5d.htm 10/3/00 Page 1 of 5 LOCATION AND INTENSITY OF URBAN DEVELOPMENT ISSUES Addressing the future form of urban development is key to developing a viable subregional strategy. By first determining the overall location and intensity of urban development, subregions build a foundation on which to base other more specific policies. OBJECTIVES There are three main objectives in developing a desired urban form: A. Ensure that the cumulative effect of new development emphasizes a compact city -centered subregional pattern to: 1. support existing urban centers, large and small; 2. improve mobility of people, goods and information; 3. optimize efficient public infrastructure which minimizes environmental costs; 4. protect agriculture, open space and other natural resources; and 5. support economic activity. B. Maintain adequate performance standards and levels of service for infrastructure, amenities, transportation and public services provided by municipalities or special districts within the subregion. C. Optimize maintenance and use of existing infrastructure while pursuing more efficient and less costly technologies. http://www.abag.ca.gov/planning/rgp/menu/menua.htmi 10/3/00 Page 2 of 5 POLICIES The following subregional policies are intended to achieve an efficient and desirable urban development form. 111J.-Tin, .0 *#1110 1 •, 1.1.441 IM 1. Encourage firm urban growth boundaries that enable achievement of objectives for housing, jobs and other development and for the conservation of agriculture, environmentally sensitive and other open space lands. 2. Encourage urban development inside urban growth boundaries while discouraging it outside such boundaries by establishing development incentives and preservation criteria. 3. Establish urban growth boundaries and designate an adequate amount, range and density of land use within these boundaries to meet projected needs. 4. Establish and permit only appropriate land uses outside urban growth boundaries, possibly including public parks and recreation areas, open space, privately -operated recreation areas and agricultural uses. 5. Pursue urban uses near urban growth boundaries that are compatible with activities outside urban growth boundaries. 6. Establish an urban growth plan for the subregion that defines areas within urban growth boundaries suitable for varying levels and intensities of urban development, designates which development should occur first, and develops a hierarchy of areas for subsequent development. 7. Designate as greenbelt all lands beyond urban growth boundaries and protect such lands through open space zoning, joint agreements and, where necessary, acquisition, to ensure greenbelt uses are appropriate ANNEXATION AND URBAN EXPANSION http://www.abag.ca.gov/planning/rgp/menu/menua.html 10/3/00 Page 3 of 5 1. Encourage annexations that conform to an orderly expansion of city boundaries within planned urban growth areas and provide for a contiguous development pattern. 2. Develop vacant or underutilized land within existing city limits whenever and wherever possible, prior to an extension of development outside of incorporated areas. 3. Establish criteria for evaluating proposed annexations of land to cities which assure that: o the land is within urban growth boundaries; o water, sewer, police, fire, and school services have adequate capacity; o the land within incorporated areas is unsuitable or insufficient to meet current land use needs; o the land abuts incorporated areas or existing or planned city streets on at least one side; and o the land .is not under an agricultural preserve or open space contract. 4. Work with LAFCO to add the above criteria to those required by existing state law. INFRASTRUCTURE 1. Encourage growth to be directed to where infrastructure capacity is available or committed including; but not limited to, road, transit, water, solid waste disposal and sewage treatment. 2. Encourage interjurisdictional. cooperation to eliminate costly duplication of capital infrastructure, public facilities and services. 3. Encourage cost-effective maintenance of existing public facilities and services as well as new investment to keep up with demand and achieve subregional objectives. 4. Discourage "leap frog" development by programming the extension of water and sewer lines only to areas contiguous with existing development. 5. Invest in major public facilities and urban amenities that support the further development of http://www.abag.ca.gov/planning/rgp/menu/menua.html 10/3/00 Page 4 of 5 urban centers. 6. Ensure that special purpose districts and other service providers have capacity and will provide, in a timely manner, necessary services where the subregion agrees that development is planned or expected. 7. Pursue efforts to combine special districts to service subregional areas where efficiencies will result. 8. Establish and maintain levels of service and recommended standards for various components of the subregional infrastructure. 9. Phase and limit extension of urban services to occur only within urban growth boundaries. 10. Identify needed public facilities of regional and subregional significance, and assure that new development planning and approval is accompanied by firm commitments to provide such infrastructure. 11. Coordinate development of long range policies and capital improvement programs of all levels of government and special districts to ensure that infrastructure and services support achievement of subregional objectives through the timely and cost-effective action. 12. Adopt development mitigation programs to ensure that new development meets subregional objectives and pays its fair share of the cost of providing police, fire, parks, water, sewer and flood control facilities and services. LAND USE AND DEVELOPMENT INTENSITY 1. Encourage employment, commercial, residential and social activities to be located close together to help contain growth and reduce the need for travel. 2. Encourage higher density residential development to be located within convenient walking distance of downtowns and near major office developments, retail centers and transit stations. 3. Establish minimum densities in areas designated as high density, for redevelopment, and in areas with existing infrastructure capacity able to handle growth. Dynamic http://www.abag.ca.gov/planning/rgp/menu/menua.html 10/3/00 Page 5 of 5 4. Develop incentive programs to encourage infill, redevelopment and reuse of vacant and underused parcels within existing urban areas. 5. Implement programs to identify and overcome potential difficulties associated with redevelopment and infill, such as on -site toxics in industrial areas and neighborhood opposition. Bac k 4F7o_m_e marchct W text Copyright c0 1996-1998 ABAG. All rights reserved. cl 07121199 http://www.abag.ca.gov/planning/rgp/menu/menua.html 10/3/00 Effects of Urban Growth Boundaries Page 1 of 2 Using Urban Growth Boundaries to Preserve Undeveloped Land As communities throughout American wrestle with the challenges of growth management and urban sprawl, the concept of the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) has become popular among citizens and city planners. The UGB is viewed as a way to better resolve the controversy between conservation and development. Growth boundaries bring certainty, like it or not, to the issue of which lands in a community will be developed and conserved. They are intended to generate programs that encourage appropriate development inside of the boundary and that enhance long term ecological, agricultural and other uses of natural lands outside of the boundary. The UGB is a line drawn on planning and zoning maps to show where a city expects to grow. The area between the UGB and the city limits is "urbanizable land", or undeveloped land that will accommodate the city's future growth. Land outside the UGB is to remain rural. Urban services like sewers won't be extended there and the zoning prohibits most development and the creation of small new subdivided lots. Most of the land outside the urban growth boundary will continue to be used for farming, forestry, recreation, and wildlife habitat. A UGB is more than just a line separating cities from countryside. A long term boundary is a pro- active growth management tool that seeks to contain, control, direct or phase growth in order to promote more compact, contiguous urban development. The other key purpose of a UGB is to protect farmlands and other resource lands like watersheds or wildlife habitat from scattered or low density development. There are many advantages to creating an urban growth boundary. It affirms a community's identity by ensuring that it doesn't merge with nearby communities and it saves tax dollars by using public facilities more efficiently. A UGB can encourage the development of more affordable housing and it can stimulate community development patterns that support more accessible public transit, enabling quick open space retreats from urban centers. It brings together the diverse interests of environmentalists, developers, citizens and farmers, who want more certainty about which land can and cannot be developed, and it encourages long-term strategic thinking and compromise about a community's future. Sometimes UGBs are established by voter approval (much longer lasting) and sometimes by council action but essentially, drawing an urban growth boundary is a joint effort. The city and its citizens who will be surrounded by the boundary, the adjoining county, and public districts responsible for providing services like water and fire protection all play a key role in the UGB's determination and planning. After local constituents draw a UGB, a state agency generally reviews it to make sure it is consistent with statewide growth goals. In California, state law is nonexistent (for now) on the issue of growth boundaries, leaving them to the local option. In Oregon, however, "Goal 14" which was drafted in the 1970's by the Land Conservation and Development Commission, requires cities to adopt a UGB in a cooperative process, considering several factors in drawing the boundary. Some of these factors are called "need factors" and deal with the question of how much land should be brought into the urban growth boundary. The amount of land to be included in the UGB depends on how much the city is expected to grow. City officials estimate growth by making population projections, trying to be consistent with those of other local governments in the area. Next, the city decides how much vacant land is likely to be needed to accommodate the expected growth. After this decision, the planners subtract the amount of vacant land that is already available within the current city limits. The difference is the amount of urbanizable land beyond city limits that is needed for future growth. http://www.therig.com/Open%20Space/ISSUES/urbangrowthboundaries.htm 10/3/00 Effects of Urban Growth Boundaries Page 2 of 2 Other factors, known as "locational factors" deal with where the boundary should be placed once the size has been determined. The locational factors focus on three main issues: efficient use of land, protection of agricultural land at the city's edge, and cost-effective public services. For example, rugged, hilly areas which would be costly to serve with sewers, water, and streets are usually not included in the UGB. Of course, this is a simplistic overview of the complex processes that go into defining a UGB. The boundaries of a UGB are not necessarily permanent. Once a UGB is adopted, its size can be increased based on a demonstrated need for more urban land and that the area selected for the addition is shown to be superior to other areas. In particular, people must show that population or employment growth is much different than originally expected, or that meeting the employment, housing and livability needs of the urban population requires a change in the land base. UGBs are not changed easily. Essentially, UGBs are driven by economics and the necessity for cities to keep costs down. This aspect is crucial for successful land preservation because community desire alone to save land for environmental and recreational uses is a losing proposition. Oregon's 20+ years of experience with urban growth boundaries have shown them to be highly effective. UGBs have helped to hold down the costs of public services and facilities there and they have saved a great deal of farmland and open space from urban sprawl. They have led to better coordination of city and county land -use planning and they have brought greater certainty for those who own, use, or invest in land at the city's edge. Of course, UGB's are not good for everyone. One flaw is that some land owners find it impossible to pass land onto their children. The urban growth boundary has worked, not perfectly, but well enough for a system governing such a complex and contentious subject as land development. Back to Issues Page http://www.therig.com/Open%20Space/ISSUES/urbangrowthboundaries.htm 10/3/00 Goal 14: Urbanization Page 1 of 2 Goal 14: Urbanization To provide for an orderly and efficient transition from rural to urban land use. Urban growth boundaries shall be established to identify and separate urbanizable land from rural land. Establishment and change of the boundaries shall be based upon considerations of the following factors: (1) Demonstrated need to accommodate long-range urban population growth requirements consistent with LCDC goals; (2) Need for housing, employment opportunities, and livability; (3) Orderly and economic provision for public facilities and services; (4) Maximum efficiency of land uses within and on the fringe of the existing urban area; (5) Environmental, energy, economic and social consequences; (6) Retention of agricultural land as defined, with Class I being the highest priority for rentention and Class VI the lowest priority; and, (7) Compatibility of the proposed urban uses with nearby agricultural activities. The results of the above considerations shall be included in the comprehensive plan. In the case of a change of a boundary, a governing body proposing such change in the boundary separating urbanizable lands from rural land, shall follow the procedures and requirements as set forth in the Land Use Planning goal (Goal 2) for goal exceptions. Any urban growth boundary established prior to January 1, 1975, which includes rural lands that have not been built upon shall be reviewed by the governing body, utilizing the same factors applicable to the establishment or change of urban growth boundaries. Establishment and change of the boundaries shall be a cooperative process between a city and the county or counties that surround it. Land within the boundaries separating urbanizable land from rural land shall be considered available over time for urban uses. Conversion of urbanizable land to urban uses shall be based on consideration of: (1) Orderly, economic provision for public facilities and services; (2) Availability of sufficient land for the various uses to insure choices in the market place; (3) LCDC goals or the acknowledged comprehensive plan; and, (4) Encouragement of development within urban areas before conversion of urbanizable areas. Cl I I113��11►�.� 27/09/00 Goal 14: Urbanization Page 2 of 2 A. PLANNING 1. Plans should designate sufficient amounts of urbanizable land to accommodate the need for further urban expansion, taking into account (1) the growth policy of the area, (2) the needs of the forecast population, (3) the carrying capacity of the planning area, and (4) open space and recreational needs. 2. The size of the parcels of urbanizable land that are converted to urban land should be of adequate dimension so as to maximize the utility of the land resource and enable the logical and efficient extension of services to such parcels. 3. Plans providing for the transition from rural to urban land use should take into consideration as-te-a ma r- etenuinant the carrying capacity of the air, land and water resources of the planning area. The land conservation and development actions provided for by such plans should not exceed the carrying capacity of such resources. B. IMPLEMENTATION 1. The type, location and phasing of public facilities and services are factors which should be utilized to direct urban expansion. 2. The type, design, phasing and location of major public transportation facilities (i.e., all modes: air, marine, rail, mass transit, highways, bicycle and pedestrian) and improvements thereto are factors which should be utilized to support urban expansion into urbanizable areas and restrict it from rural areas. 3. Financial incentives should be provided to assist in maintaining the use and character of lands adjacent to urbanizable areas. 4. Local land use controls and ordinances should be mutually supporting, adopted and enforced to integrate the type, timing and location of public facilities and services in a manner to accommodate increased public demands as urbanizable lands become more urbanized. 5. Additional methods and devices for guiding urban land use should include but not be limited to the following: (1) tax incentives and disincentives; (2) multiple use and joint development practices; (3) fee and less -than -fee acquisition techniques; and (4) capital improvement programming. 6. Plans should provide for a detailed management program to assign respective implementation roles and responsibilities to those governmental bodies operating in the planning area and having interests in carrying out the goal. On to Cloal 15 Back to the Table of Contents Back to the Land Use Information Center Home Back to the PPPM Home Page 4/95 27/09/00 Sprawl Can Be Good By Frederick Steiner Under certain circumstances, and with good planning, dispersed settlement may be the way to go. haos is the law of nature, order is the dream of man," wrote the author of The Education of Henry Adams in 1905. I think he had a point. Conventional planning wisdom is un- forgiving about suburban sprawl —the kind of dispersed settlement associated with almost every American metropoli- tan area. Sprawl is out of synch with natural processes. It wastes resources and energy. It discourages community and encourages segregation. It gobbles up prime farmland. For many, sprawl in the U.S. is epito- mized by the suburbs of the Southwest. A notable symbol is the group of 10 half - buried Cadillacs along Route 66 near Amarillo, Texas; the cars were put there in 1974 by the Ant Farm, a San Francisco artists' collective. Author Marc Reisner took the image further in his provocative 1986 book, Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water. The Cadillac is a bloated, wasteful, gas -guz- zler. The notion of the Southwest as the Cadillac of American settlement is com- pelling, albeit slanderous. Despite such images, I believe that in certain situations —and with true plan- ning —dispersed settlement can actually have beneficial consequences. Sprawl is like cholesterol. There is bad sprawl and good sprawl. Its effects depend on the designers, planners, developers, and pub- lic officials involved. And as with choles- terol, moderation is key. Saturn Desert In parts of the Southwest, a good kind of sprawl is emerging. The area I'm talking about is the distinctive desert region called the Sonora, which extends into north- western Mexico. I call this region the "Saturn Desert," after General Motors's- attempt to rethink and redesign the Ameri- can automobile. The name evokes im- ages of the ringed planet Saturn —and of the Roman god of agriculture and vegeta- tion for whom the planet was named. The Sonoran desert has long been a spawning ground for urban visionaries. From the fourth century to the 15th cen- tury,when they mysteriously disappeared, the Hohokam Indians built a thriving, dispersed civilization in what is now Phoe- nix. They left behind the remnants of the canal system that allowed the city's first settlers to survive the desert heat. Earlier in this century, Frank Lloyd Wright de- veloped his vision of a sprawling, subur- ban Broadacre City just outside' Phoenix at Taliesin West. Today, Paolo Soleri plugs away at his organic megastructure, Arcosanti, while to the south, near Tuc- son, Biosphere II presents yet another alternative for future settlement. Both Soleri and the Biosphere adher- ents say their aim is sustainability, devel- opment that respects the environment. As it is now, the region can hardly be called "sustainable." Sprawling Maricopa County, surrounding Phoenix, now has a population of over two million; Tucson's metropolitan area is about 650,000. The region's farmers are rapidly depleting groundwater aquifers, cotton farms are polluting the water, and citrus orchards are disappearing, the victim of new ur- ban development. Temperatures are ris- ing because of the urban heat island effect, and the military is using much of the desert as a bomb site. All winter, visiting senior citizens, known locally as "snow birds," descend like aluminum - clad locusts in their motor homes. It is a challenging place to live. Frank Lloyd Wright described the Sonoran desert as a place "where plants exist between hell and high water." Yet newcomers continue to arrive daily —and to stay. They like their back- yard swimming pools and barbecues. They like the perception of safety and the easy access to open space. Housing prices are reasonable for a broad spectrum of people, putting Phoenix among ` the cities that have the highest percentage of home own- ership. If we believe that widespread property ownership is a concomitant of democratic government, as Locke and Jefferson did, then the Phoenix region is the embodiment of the American dream. 15 Moreover, these suburbs, like those across the U.S., are the result not of bad planning —as many like to think —but of rational zoning, and subdivision laws and ordinances. These laws and ordinances more or less institutionalized the designs conceived by the noted suburban plan- ners of the early years of the century — people like the Olmsteds and John Nolen — and later adapted (or perhaps bastardized) for the automobile. Magic in water But can such patterns be sustained when the population of the region doubles, as demographers expect it will in the next 30 years or so? Or will we see a repeat of the experience of the Hohokam, "the people who disappeared"? The answer, in large measure, depends on water. "If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water," wrote Loren Eiseley in The Immense Journey in 1957. Just as the planet Saturn is inseparable from its rings, the author argues, so are the cities of the Sonoran desert indivisible from their surrounding regions. The Sonora, a corruption of the Virgin Mary's title, Senora, is among the hottest and driest places on earth. Farmers in the valleys depend on the winter rain —snow in the mountains —from the north, which gets them through the spring drought. The dramatic summer rains, locally called monsoons, are followed by another drought season in the fall. Geologists` call the Arizona portion of the Sonoran desert "basin and range." The name expresses an important rela- tionship. The broad alluvial valleys (ba- sins) are surrounded by elongated moun- tain ranges, oriented from northwest to southeast. (From the air, one observer noted, they look like caterpillars migrat- ing south to Mexico.) Moisture, captured in the higher elevations as it moves in from the sea, falls to the ground and as snow is stored in the mountains until it melts and flows into the basins below. Much water also seeps from the higher elevations into the ground. The water then reemerges at lower elevations, so much so that one derivation of the By irrigating, the Hohokam and other Indians built thriving civilizations in Arizona that lasted for 1,000 years. name of Arizona is "from the place of small springs." The higher the range, the more the precipitation. The farther from the mountains, the drier the desert, and the less the surface water flow. The orientation and steepness of the slopes also has a strong impact on water flow and plant growth. Surprisingly, in fact, the Sonora is rather lush. There are small, thin -leaved shrubs and trees like the creosote bush and palo verde, and, of course, many varieties of cac- tus, including the magnificent saguaro, whose vertical ribs expand like an accordion when water is available. The megastructure of Arcosanti is slowly taking shape in the desert northwest of Phoenix. 16 Planning July 1994 Facing facts It is water that performs magic in the Sonoran region, water that flows from the mountains and the sea. If the region is to accommodate twice as many people, this fact must be recognized. That means, first, a drastic reduction in the use of water —as much as 50 per- cent per capita. One way to do that is to increase the use of treated wastewater for cotton farming and nonfood agricul- tural crops, and certainly for golf course turf. Second, it means reducing dependence on fossil fuel for transportation, turning instead to solar -powered batteries. For greater distances, between Phoenix and Tucson, for instance, a high-speed rail line could be the answer. We also need to think about the region in a new way, .not as a collection of separate jurisdictions but as a cohesive whole. I think of the Sonoran region as a series of Saturn -like planets surrounded by their rings. One. "planet" is the desert. Around it are the rings that give it life and shape its identity —the mountains and the sea. Phoenix is another Saturn, encircled by rings of public and Indian lands. What I believe we should be doing is "thinking Saturnly. " By that I mean thinking of a region and its needs —in this case the need for water. Then we have to do some fundamental rethinking of our patterns of development, although that doesn't necessarily mean throwing out the old patterns entirely. Some of the develop- ment that exists is simply unsustainable and should not be perpetuated. In some cases, it can be replaced by infill devel- opment. But in many cases, we will be able to plan a kind of good sprawl — sustainable sprawl. Of course, not'all of the Sonora should be given over to sprawl. Existing cities should have higher density development wherever possible. And for the rural ar- eas, we should once again consider the ideas expressed by John Wesley Powell in the 1870s. Noting the success of the Mormons, he advocated water rights co- operatives, not so different from today's Salt River Project. Based on the experi- ence of the Spanish, he advocated com- mon cattle -grazing areas. Farther out, I suggest that we consider returning much of the Sonora to nature as a preserve for the gray wolf, a varia- tion of the Buffalo Commons idea pro- posed for the Great Plains by Frank and Deborah Popper. ,(See "The Great Plains: From Dust to Dust," December 1987.) It's an idea strongly advocated by the Wildlands Project of Tucson. In addition to maintaining biodiversity, such a pre- serve would provide water for the region's cities and farms. For the rest, planned sprawl would not be so bad. In some areas, we might even encourage corridors of linear sprawl. An example might be the high-speed rail corridor from Phoenix through Tucson, Nogales, and Hermosillo to Guayamas. Benign sprawl But it is benign sprawl that I am talking about. That means, among other things, development that uses water -conserving native vegetation, that retains stormwater on site, and that harnesses the energy of the region's greatest strength, the sun. The sustainable development I am ad- vocating would also make use of local architectural images —including, in this case, the much -maligned wall. Walled back yards and even walls around neigh- borhoods are dominant features on the Phoenix landscape. They are mostly scorned by architects, city planners, and landscape architects. Yet masonry walls and enclosed court- yards are common in desert cities through- out the world. For example, the atriums of Roman houses husbanded water resources and provided a cool respite to the surrounding city. In the old South- west, Mexico, and much of Span- ish America, the hacienda had a similar design. Walls make desert living pleasanter by providing protection from the bright sun and blowing dust. A classic view of the Cadillac desert —where heavy irrigation is needed to grow crops. Too often, discussions of suburban de- velopment break down into arguments over dispersal versus density. But each has its place, I would say. Frank Lloyd Wright's Broadacre City model repre- sents one vision of an organic, living city —a vision that is strikingly similar in several respects to present-day Phoenix. Critic Peter Rowe defends Wright's pro- posal by noting that "there was an insis- tence on regional authenticity and mean- ingful functional integration that we might do well to practice today, together with a regard for both buildings and land as being parts of a more general and signifi- cant landscape." Paolo Soleri has suggested an alternative and far denser urban vision in Arizona. Like Wright, Soleri's model city, Arcosanti, respects the landscape, merging architec- ture and ecology. But, where Wright's or- ganic city was dispersed, Soleri's is densely clustered. While many of Soleri's ideas seem antidemocratic to Americans, his de- sign ideas —including apses to take advan- tage of different angles of the sun, and chimneys to funnel cool air —could be use- fully applied to other forms of housing. A brick -and -stucco wall surrounds a residential neighborhood in Tempe. 17 Arcosanti's apses (above) could make the most —or the least=of the sun. Below: a recent subdivision built in a citrus orchard in suburban Mesa. Civano, an 820- village'planned would vastly re energy use. The by the state of A expects to sell it who pledge to u standards of en Funding for the of the plan is be d New ideas A couple of current projects are also promising. The Tucson -Pima County Metropolitan Energy Commission recently completed a plan for an 820-acre "solar village" in Tucson. The plan for "Civano," which could eventually house 5,000 people, calls for reducing typical energy use by 75 percent through solar design and conservation. The plan also calls for reducing by 90 percent the amount of landfill -destined solid waste, and for cutting air pollution by 40 percent by encouraging bicycle and pedestrian use. A key goal is to pro- vide one job in the community for every two residential units built. Civano is a rare ex- ample of a community being planned to meet specific performance targets for sustainability. Its plan is also based on a thorough analysis of ecological processes to determine suitability for specific land uses. Another project, Rosa Vista, is by the Miami - based team of Andres Duany and Elizabeth- Plater-Zyberk, working with Max Underwood of Tempe, the landscape acre "solar architects of Design d for Tucson Workshop in Aspen and uce typical Tempe, and land plan - land is owned ner Jack Gilcrest of THK rizona, which Associates in Phoenix. to developers This team has designed phold ergy efficiency. a 30-acre, 383-unit manu- initial stages factured housing devel- ing provided opment east of Mesa, by the state Energy Office. Arizona, for the innovative Denver de- veloper, Craig Bowman. The plan, which includes low walls, encourages the use of native vegetation and is oriented to enhance views of sur- rounding mountains. Rosa Vista is also a good example of infill development, a necessity in an area where large tracts remain undeveloped within cities' incor- porated boundaries. An older example is the Phoenix neigh- borhood of Arcadia, where single-family housing is integrated with citrus orchards. Several new developments in the Mesa area are based on similar ideas. In the future, I would suggest that houses be clustered on southwest -facing slopes to take advantage of the sun angle and winds. Walls and plantings should be used to create pleasant microclimates within housing clusters. Close to nature A fascinating quality of the Sonora is the immediacy of the environment. Ecology is not abstract, as is evident from the names we humans give things there: the Phoenix Suns, Sky Harbor Airport, the Sun Devils, Sunny 97 FM,, the Desert Sky Pavilion. Like the Southwest generally, this re- gion demands a very special settlement pattern. The issue is not whether that settlement should be dispersed or not — but whether it is ecologically sound. Both high- and low -density settlements are pos- sible, and. probably desirable, if done with quality, equity, and environmental sensitivity. Frederick Steiner is director of the School of Planning and Landscape Architecture at Ari- zona State University in Tempe. Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 1 of 11 X Reason Public Policy Institute HOME I Publications Policy Center Education ( Environment 1 Transportation Program 1i Privatization & Government Reform Social Policy ( Urban Land Use& Economic Development Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland By Samuel R. Staley and Gerard C.S. Mildner October 1999 Executive Summary Urban -growth boundaries are emerging as one of the most popular growth -management tools in the fight against suburbanization. More than 100 cities and counties have adopted them, and statewide mandates for growth boundaries exist in Oregon, Washington, and Tennessee. Urban -growth boundaries, however, have potentially large, if unintended, negative impacts on housing. The burden of these impacts will most likely be felt by low-, moderate-, and middle -income households since their housing choices will be the most severely constrained. An examination of housing -production trends and home prices in Napa County, California found that: Housing production fell by 74.2 percent when strict growth controls in Napa County, California were implemented, creating an effective countywide urban -growth boundary; and Housing prices soared in rural parts of the county as demand outstripped supply, increasing the price "premium" for rural housing from 16.3 percent in 1985 to 84.8 percent over the county average in 1997. Similar impacts were found in Portland, Oregon where a regional -growth boundary hems in 24 cities and three counties. A review of research and housing data found: Portland now ranks among the 10 percent least affordable housing markets in the nation; The average housing density has increased from five homes per acre to eight homes per acre while multifamily housing units makeup about half of all new building permits; Even with these increases in density, the Portland area is expected to have a housing http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 2 of 11 deficit of almost 9,000 housing units by 2040; High rates of infill and redevelopment were associated with low overall levels of housing production; and More than 80,000 single-family homes became "unaffordable" to Portland residents as a result of housing -price inflation. Several lessons were gleaned from Napa County and Portland's experience with growth boundaries: . Growth boundaries contribute to higher housing costs, although the magnitude is uncertain. Metro, Portland's regional -planning agency, could alleviate housing costs by releasing more low-cost vacant land for development but chooses not to; . Growth boundaries encourage consumers to buy larger homes with fewer open -space amenities such as private yards; . Growth boundaries create new special -interest groups that will oppose growth - boundary expansion, including high -income hobby farmers who want to protect their rural lifestyle; . Recalls of local officials and the defeat of new funding for the regional -rail system suggests that public support for urban -growth boundaries in Portland may be weakening; and . Higher housing prices are contributing to concerns by low- and moderate -income households that the growth boundary works against their interests, weakening overall support for regional -growth management. Urban -growth Boundaries Growth management has risen to the fore front of public debate in the United States. Both Vice President Al Gore and President Bill Clinton are promoting a "Livability Agenda" for cities and encouraging so-called "Smart Growth" initiatives to limit suburbanization and revitalize central cities. On the local level, one of the most popular Smart Growth tools is the urban -growth boundary, a politically designated line around cities beyond which development is either prohibited or highly discouraged. Growth boundaries, also called urban -limit lines or rural - limit lines,.exist in more than 100 cities, counties, and regions across the nation.1 California, in particular, has emerged as one of the most prolific centers for this approach to growth control. While popular, the full consequences of adopting these growth controls have not been fully explored. While many are geared toward curbing suburban development in outlying rural areas, growth boundaries can have unintended economic and social consequences. By restricting land availability for new housing, growth boundaries could increase the price of land and, ultimately, housing. As affordable housing disappears, economically vulnerable low- to moderate -income households suffer the most. Even middle -income families may be at risk based on emerging evidence from Portland, Oregon and California. Thus, growth boundaries may be a poor growth -management strategy, especially in areas concerned about housing affordability. Impacts such as the density versus affordability trade off are rarely discussed adequately in the heat of local growth -management debates. http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 1 l.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 3 of 11 California and the Burgeoning Growth- boundary Movement Ground zero in the growing support for growth boundaries may be California. In some states (e.g., Oregon, Washington, and Tennessee), growth boundaries were mandated by a distant state legislature. Urban -growth boundaries in California are the product of local efforts. As a result, California's growthboundaries are not uniform and the data on their impacts are mixed. Public support for growth boundaries, however, continues to grow across the state, where 80 percent of the local initiatives with growth boundaries on the ballot passed in November 1998. Frustration with lost open space, traffic congestion, and overcrowded schools led more than 20 counties and 50 cities to adopt urban -limit lines or green belts in the 1970s and 1980s.2 In the 1990s, growth -boundary activity increased and proliferated. Some California cities and counties are even shrinking their boundaries.3 A movement is afoot in Contra Costa County, just across the bay from San Francisco, to reduce its growth boundary and thwart development plans despite a projected deficit of 45,000 homes.4 The City of Cotati in Sonoma County (north of San Francisco) reduced the amount of developed and developable land inside its boundary by almost one-third. More telling may be the attempts by slow -growth advocates to convert urban -service areas — boundaries beyond which public infrastructure services such as roads, sewers, and water will not be extended —into growth boundaries. Sacramento County is a case in point. Antigrowth interest groups are transforming the county's urban -service area into an urban -growth boundary by lobbying against approval for development projects outside the service area. The most troubling characteristics of urban -growth boundaries, however, may be the inequities they create between existing homeowners and low- and moderate -income families. The City of Napa in northern California is an example. Just north of San Francisco, Napa adopted a limit line in 1975 in an attempt to cap the city's population at 75,000. Residential development was still allowed in rural areas, providing a relief valve for the residential - housing market. Then, in the early 1990s, the county clamped down on new development. Residential -building permits plummeted by 74.2 percent from 1989 to 1996 as a moratorium on residential permits took effect in the county and a regional -housing recession took hold in the early 1990s.7 As the recession gave way to the current economic boom, building permits increased, but not as quickly as in other parts of the Bay Area without growth boundaries.8 Well after the end of the recession, building permits remain at half the levels that existed before the county growth controls were instituted. An affordability wedge between rural and urban residents is also emerging in Napa County. As the growth controls took hold, the average value of a single-family home in unincorporated areas of Napa County climbed 158.1 percent to over $373,000 from 1985 to 1997.9 The average value of a new single-family home in the City of Napa increased by less than half the rate in rural areas (66.8 percent), but the rate of increase doubled after the county growth controls created an effective regional -growth boundary.10 Nevertheless, the housing -price "premium" for homes outside the more densely urbanized areas grew from 16.3 percent to 84.8 percent over the Napa County average. http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 4 of ,11 Thus, growth boundaries potentially serve up a double whammy for homebuyers. First, reducing land supplies through growth controls drives up housing prices. Then slow -growth policies outside cities create an open -space preserve that can be tapped only by high -income households. Although the data for California and Napa County are not definitive, they clearly suggest urban -growth boundaries can have the unintended impact of reducing the supply of housing. Moreover, the use of urban -growth boundaries also suggests local growth controls pass the responsibility for accommodating future housing demand and growth onto other communities. In the case of Napa County, the boundary by the county's largest city (Napa), coupled with an apparent unwillingness of other cities in the county to annex territory and provide for future growth, has had the effect of increasing housing costs and limiting the availability of housing for working families. The case of Portland, Oregon, on the other hand, provides an example of a pure urban - growth boundary that has been in place on a regional level over a longer period of time. Portland's experience should provide more direct lessons about the relationship between urban -growth boundaries and housing affordability. The Portland Case The State of Oregon implemented one of the nation's most comprehensive state -planning laws in the early 1970s. In Portland, a regional boundary has hemmed in 24 cities and three counties for 20 years and has become the linchpin to regional urban planning. Portland uses its growth boundary explicitly to increase housing density and redirect investment into inner cities. Thus, the Portland effort provides an excellent opportunity to examine the intended and unintended consequences of adopting growth boundaries. While originally intended as a dynamic tool for addressing the needs of a city's population, the growth boundary in Portland has made planning for the needs of a growing population far more complex. To more fully appreciate the relationship between growth boundaries, housing prices, and housing choice, the following sections review the effects of growth boundaries in Portland, Oregon on: . Housing cost and prices; . Housing density; ll . Developable land and infill; and . Consumer choice in the housing market. The effects of growth boundaries on housing prices and consumer choice may create a political environment that may be difficult to sustain and further compound the negative, if unintended, consequences of imposing a growth boundary. A. Housing Costs in Portland and Oregon Since the passage of Oregon's growth -management laws, the cost of housing in urban areas has increased significantly. Oregon's housing markets now rank among the nation's least affordable in the nation and on the West Coast (see Table 1).12 Eugene holds the dubious http://www.rppi.org/urban/Pbl l .html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 5 of 11 distinction of being the least affordable Oregon housing market, ranking among the bottom 3 percent in housing affordability nationwide, according to the National Association of Home Builders. Not far behind are Portland and Medford, both ranking among the bottom 10 percent. One policy goal of planning in Portland and the rest of the state is to meet the housing needs of low- and moderate -income families. Housing -price trends have important implications for affordability. One local real-estate consultant estimates that, from the second quarter 1995 through second quarter 1997, housing -price appreciation alone pushed 80,000 single-family homes over thresholds of affordability.13 In other words, 80,000 fewer units were considered "affordable" in 1997 compared to 1995. Meanwhile, from 1990 to 1997, just 6,450 single-family homes and 3,530 multifamily units were approved. Because the relationship between housing prices and land supply is complex, simple explanations for Portland's extraordinary housing -price increases are elusive. Metro has claimed that land supply is largely irrelevant for understanding Portland's recent housing - price surge, arguing that increased population growth is the primary factor influencing home prices. Housing prices in Portland, however, are not increasing in a neutral real-estate market: the amount and quality of vacant land has been falling for 20 years as a direct result of the urban -growth boundary. As land becomes more scarce inside the boundary, the increased competition for developable land inside the growth boundary appears to be contributing to higher land prices. These effects are evident in the Portland area's largest suburban county. Washington County is the second-largest county in the metropolitan area, but has the largest amount of new - home construction and the best data in the region on housing -lot prices. Lot prices for single-family houses in Washington County lagged inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) from 1985 to 1990, the years the Portland area experienced a housing recession (Figure 1).17 After 1990, housing prices increased significantly. By 1994, home prices were one and one-half times greater than in 1985 (a 140 percent increase). Lot prices more than doubled in five years while the CPI increased by 52.5 percent.18 These trends significantly surpassed Metro's housing -price forecast, which predicted land prices would rise by 20 percent in real terms from 1995 to 2000. A glimpse of the growth boundary's potential impacts on land prices became evident early.20 In 1980, just one year after Portland's regional -growth boundary was established, an analysis of 455 purchases of vacant lots for single-family homes found that land prices inside the boundary were significantly higher than those outside the boundary.21 The changes in market price were tied to expectations by builders and developers about the likelihood the land could be developed for residential purposes. Land prices varied by how much local governments restricted development and developers believed those restrictions were binding.22 Rural -land values outside the boundary fell as developers recognized its availability for urban development was limited. Land values inside the boundary increased as developers recognized its potential for development and more people were competing for the same parcel of land. Thus, strict regulatory adherence to the growth boundary resulted in the largest differences in price. As Metro has become even http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 1 l .html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 6 of 11 stricter in its adherence to minimum -density targets, land prices are likely to increase even further. B. Housing Density Another important goal of growth boundaries is increasing housing density within existing urban areas. Despite a national reputation as a growth -management success story, Oregon's planning system fell sufficiently short of this goal that many planners and policymakers argued for "mid -course corrections" as early as the mid-1980s.23 Actual densities inside the growth boundaries, for example, ranged from two-thirds to one-fourth below the levels permitted by local plans.24 Although Portland had the highest -allowable densities, actual densities were one-third lower than those allowed by local land -use plans. Portland nevertheless increased housing densities by putting more people on less land even though they were below planners' targets. Densities for new development increased on average from five homes per acre (one -fifth of an acre per home) to eight homes per acre (one -eighth of an acre per home) from 1994 to 1997.26 The amount of land used for new housing development has declined as multifamily housing units have increased from 25 percent of all building permits in 1992 to 49 percent in 1997. Even these density increases fall below the levels needed to meet Metro's (the regional planning agency) projected population increase. At current trends, without an expansion of the boundary, the Portland metropolitan area will experience a 42,060 housing -unit deficit by the year 2017.28 If densities increase to achieve those recommended in the Metro 2040 Plan, the housing deficit would still be 8,590 units. This creates a problem for local planners: if densities are too low (and more land is used per household), the urban -growth boundary will have to be expanded sooner than they predicted. In order to increase densities further and avoid expanding the growth boundary, Metro has recently implemented a mandate for a minimum density of more than six units per net acre (which is creating new economic and political problems and trade offs). C. Developable Land and Infill In order to achieve higher densities within the urban -growth boundary, Metro and Portland planners are relying on "refill." Refill consists of two elements: developing vacant land (infill) inside the growth boundary and redeveloping existing property more intensely at higher densities. An examination of the Portland model reveals another unintended effect of growth boundaries: the reliance on infill development contributes to higher housing costs and impacts the availability of affordable housing. As Metro pushes for more infill development, vacant land within the growth boundary is disappearing. Vacant land inside the boundary has fallen from 75,000 acres in 1985 to less than 55,000 today. Once environmentally sensitive and otherwise undevelopable land is considered, the amount falls to less than 38,000 acres.30 While almost 40 percent of the land in the boundary was vacant in 1980, the share of total vacant land represented just 19.8 percent of the land by 1997, less than 14 percent when undevelopable land is considered. Metro estimates Portland's current refill rate at 25.4 percent.32 In other words, about one- http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 7 of 11 fourth of all housing units built inside the growth boundary are either infill or redevelopment of existing property. Metro, however, also found that the rate of residential redevelopment and infill was negatively related to the total housing built when the data were broken down by neighborhood.23 High refill rates, it turns out, require higher home prices to justify the development of smaller and relatively more -expensive parcels of land.34 In addition, if homebuyers cannot trade off home size for larger lots, they may invest in building bigger and more expansive homes. Thus, Portland was achieving a higher rate of infill and redevelopment because land and housing prices were increasing. Inner-city Portland appeared to benefit from these higher rates of redevelopment. From 1990 to 1995, inner-city neighborhoods in Portland experienced a substantial increase in home - price inflation: the North, Southeast, and Northeast areas of the City of Portland saw their housing prices increase the fastest (Table 2). Home prices in North Portland doubled, rising from $41,300 in 1990 to $83,800 in 1995 (in noninflation adjusted dollars). The average home price among these cities increased from $97,684 to $152,700. For those favoring growth boundaries, these trends suggest success. Higher refill rates and rebounding home prices in inner-city neighborhoods should mean the goals of revitalization and increasing density are being met. These observers, however, may be ignoring the trade offs implicit in these trends. Higher housing prices are a double-edged sword. On the one hand, housing demand is pushed inward as land becomes more scarce on the fringe. Higher land prices create incentives for higher -density development in existing suburbs and inner-city neighborhoods.35 As suburban neighborhoods achieve higher densities and become less distinguishable from inner-city neighborhoods, higher -income households look at inner city and suburban locations more competitively. Higher -housing prices, on the other hand, may also reflect a supply constraint. With the imposition of an effective growth boundary, consumers have fewer housing choices than under a freely functioning land market since developers are more limited in the kinds of homes they can provide. Rural and semi -rural settings for homes and communities will be reduced for all except the wealthiest families and long-time residents. In this case, higher - housing prices reduce the overall quality of life for residents, since they must pay more for a home that provides potentially fewer benefits (e.g., smaller lots and denser living). Many households are buying what is available in a restrictive housing environment as new homes on lots larger than one -fifth of an acre are prohibited. Higher refill rates come at a cost: higher housing prices, less affordable housing, and less private open space in the form of yards. D. Consumer Behavior Land, as the previous section discussed, is an important beneficial characteristic of a home. Sometimes this land is privately owned (e.g., back and front yards), and sometimes it is public open space (e.g., a neighborhood park). Not surprisingly, when land is abundant, people prefer homes with larger lots. As housing prices increase, homebuyers recalculate the benefits of different housing characteristics. Since houses usually provide important, high - priority benefits —bedrooms for personal privacy, shelter from the elements, kitchens, etc.— homebuyers will often choose smaller lots when home prices are high. Thus, growth http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 8 of 11 boundaries influence the housing decisions by families and other households as well. Portland, Oregon provides an interesting application of this housing "substitution" effect. When Metro began implementing its land -use plan in the early 1990s, developers were allowed to build more houses on each acre of land as maximum densities allowed by local zoning codes increased. By the mid- 1990s, the effects on the local real-estate market were becoming apparent. Researchers at Metro examined almost 8,000 home sales from January 1996 through June 1997 to determine how households responded to higher housing prices and whether a lot size/building size tradeoff existed. 36 Portland -area homebuyers, it turned out, did not buy larger lots as home prices increased for houses of the same size.37 As home prices increased, homebuyers bought larger homes on smaller lots. For homes in different sizes categories (large vs. small), researchers also found that consumers traded off lot size for home size.38 Of course, these trade offs were made in an artificially constrained and manipulated market. The growth boundary is a politically designated barrier, not one chosen by consumers trading in an open market. The Politics of Growth -boundary Expansion Metro claims that the urban -growth boundary is not intended to prevent housing development. Rather, the goal is to manage growth. The boundary was originally expected to be a dynamic, growth -management tool: as land became more scarce, local officials and planners would expand the boundary to accommodate more growth. Portland politics is making expansion of the growth boundary difficult. In 1997, Metro's executive officer recommended a 7,000-acre expansion of the growth boundary to accommodate new growth.39 The Metro Council voted down the recommendation five votes to two. Metro eventually expanded the boundary by 5,300 acres in 1998,40 but the expansion represents about two years of the average land take-up through development.41 More significantly, the expansion was a compromise between environmental activists, zero - expansion advocates, and prodevelopment groups. Even while local planners may favor a more dynamic approach to land supply within the growth boundary, regional politics may prevent its timely expansion. A close examination of the Portland case reveals that, once implemented, growth boundaries make planning decisions more difficult and political. As a result, responding to increased housing demand and population growth becomes a function of local and regional political forces, rather than land -use planning. Local politics is making growth -boundary expansion difficult in part because the planning process itself is creating new winners and losers. A. Low-income Households Low-income households, for instance, were once considered big winners from statewide planning. Oregon's planning law included a plank supporting the housing needs of all residents in the state, and many believed a properly planned region would yield affordable housing.42 Strong demand for inner-city housing, however, has pushed up prices in inner- city Portland neighborhoods faster than in suburban communities, displacing some low- and moderate -income families. Low-income housing strategies such as inclusionary zoning are unlikely to significantly http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 Uzban-Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 9 of 11 improve affordable housing. Portland has considered an inclusionary-zoning program that would require developers to provide affordable housing. If the plan had been enacted during the 1990s, "affordable" homes and apartments would have represented just two percent of the units that "disappeared" as a result of escalating housing prices.43 Programs such as the one considered by Metro would make little headway in improving affordability in the Portland metropolitan area. B. "Hobby" Farmers The growth boundary has had another unintended side effect. A new interest group consisting of noncommercial farmers, sometimes called "hobby farmers," has emerged that is highly resistant to expansions of the growth boundary. Many of these households appear to be circumventing Metro's restrictive land -use policies by buying properties outside the growth boundary and calling them farms. Ninety percent of the farms under 160 acres where new homes were authorized in the 1980s reported no farm receipts.44 Half of the farm operations with new homes were in the Willamette Valley, which contains the City of Portland and about 60 percent of Oregon's residents.45 By planting a field of Christmas trees or a large patch of strawberries, these landowners have been able to get rural homebuilding permits under the exemption for farmers. Ironically, by building their homes on large rural parcels, these hobby farmers are creating the exurban sprawl that many of growth -boundary advocates wish to avoid. Hobby farmers are hostile to boundary expansions because higher - residential densities and development of nearby open space would diminish their quality of life. Lessons from Portland Several events suggest that grassroots opposition to regional planning is emerging as an important political force. Metro is experiencing significant resistance to higher -density residential development and the proposed transportation plan by grassroots groups. For example: A regionwide referendum to fund the region's light -rail extension was rejected in November 1998; and Residents of the suburban community of Milwaukie, Oregon recalled all city council members that voted to accept Metro's high -density zoning mandate to accommodate future population growth. Growth management in the Portland region is becoming less stable politically as new interest groups and coalitions emerge to support specific aspects of the regional plan. As land inside the growth boundary becomes increasingly scarce, housing prices have increased significantly. Portland still retains many of the characteristics of suburban living that the growth boundary was intended to discourage. Ironically, achieving density targets may only be possible through high housing prices that make expensive and inefficient parcels of land profitable to develop through the private sector. While some believe a substantial amount of land still exists within the urban -growth boundary for land development, Metro is predicting a housing deficit even if significantly higher densities are achieved on current land. In fact, the remaining land inside the boundary is generally less productive and more expensive to develop. Combined with a political http://www.rppi.org/urban/pbl 1.html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 10 of.11 climate supportive of zero growth, Metro will not likely expand the growth boundary significantly to moderate upward pressure on housing prices. Several lessons can be gleaned from Portland's experience with growth boundaries. . First, urban -growth boundaries can achieve goals such as encouraging higher residential densities and infill, but these outcomes come at a cost. If the growth boundary is successful, it will constrain vacant land and require housing development on more -expensive land and on lots much smaller than consumers would otherwise prefer. . Second, growth boundaries encourage consumers to trade off land for larger homes with fewer open -space amenities such as private yards and reduce their overall quality of life by constraining land supply and contributing to higher land costs. . Third, growth boundaries contribute to higher housing costs, although the magnitude is uncertain. Metro could help alleviate housing costs by releasing more low-cost vacant land for development (although it chooses not to). . Fourth, growth boundaries will encourage the creation of new interest groups opposed to growth -boundary expansion. Local policymakers will be encouraged to maintain the boundary as a binding constraint on land development, opting for increasing densities in existing areas rather than expanding the boundary significantly. . Fifth, the political support for growth boundaries and growth management in general will change as the full consequences of the policies become evident. Higher housing prices, for example, are contributing to concerns by low- and moderate -income households that the growth boundary may work against their interests. To avoid the unintended side effects of urban -growth boundaries, state and local policymakers should consider alternative, market -based approaches to growth management. Market -based approaches substitute a regulatory approach to development that restricts consumer choice for one where the real-estate market and incentives are created to achieve the same goals. Examples of market -oriented approaches include reforming zoning ordinances to allow for market -determined densities, allowing for administrative review of development projects without significant negative impacts on neighboring property owners and the community more generally, privatization or full -cost pricing for public infrastructure, and voluntary conservation easements and privately funded purchase -of - development rights to protect open space. Glossary of Terms Density: number of people or households per acre of land. Green belt: a strip of dedicated open space around cities where land development is prohibited except for agricultural, park land, and open -space uses. Growth management: the direction, control, channeling, or guidance of commercial and residential development through public policy. Housing amenity: quality or characteristic of a home. Housing -substitution effect: the trade offs consumers make among housing characteristics http://www.rppi.org/urban/Pbl l .html 10/3/00 Urban -Growth Boundaries and Housing Affordability: Lessons from Portland Page 11 of 11 such as lot size, bedrooms, garage areas, bathrooms, etc. Infill: the development of vacant land in already urbanized areas with existing homes and buildings. Infrastructure: public services such as roads, sewers, water, schools, etc. Low density: low number of people or households per acre of land. Single-family, detached homes with large lots are often defined as low density, although the actual size of the lot is rarely specified. Metro: the regional planning agency overseeing Portland's growth boundary and the implementation of the region's 2040 long-range plan. Metro's board is the only elected regional government in the nation and is responsible for regional transportation and land -use planning. Refill: the combination of infill development and redevelopment of existing land in urbanized areas. Urban -growth boundaries (or urban -limit lines): politically designated line around cities beyond which development is either prohibited or highly discouraged. Urban -service area: a boundary beyond which public infrastructure services will not be extended. 3415 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Suite 400 Los Angeles, CA 90034 1 (310) 391-2245 http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb 11.html 10/3/00 To query across multiple grid themes 1 From the Analysis menu, choose Map Query. 2 The Map Query dialog aids in the creation of an expression that subsets cells that meet the specified criterion of a query. The criterion can be based on single or multiple grid themes. To aid in the creation of the expression, there are three groups of inputs in the Map Query dialog. The first is the Layers scrolling list which identifies the available grid layers in the active view, the second, a series of operators to be used in the evaluation of the expression, and the third, a scrolling list of the Unique or Sample Values within the highlighted layer of the Layers scrolling list. A typical sample session follows. 3 Double-click on a layer from the Layers scrolling list. 4 Press one of the relational operators (e.g., =, <>, >, >=, <, or <_). 5 Double-click on a value from the Sample or Unique Values scrolling list, or type a value into the expression box. 6 Press a Boolean operator (e.g., and or or) from the operator group of buttons. 7 Choose a second layer from the Layers scrolling list. s Press a relational operator button. 9 Choose a value from the Sample or Unique Value scrolling list, or type a value into the expression box. 10 Repeat steps 6 - 9 until you've entered all evaluation criteria into the query expression. Press Evaluate. As you make selections from the input scrolling lists and buttons, an expression builds in the expression box in the Map Query dialog. If you use the mouse to select from the input scrolling lists and buttons, only valid expressions can be created in the expression box. However, if you type directly into the expression box, you can create an invalid expression. Once you make a choice from one of the input scrolling lists or press a button, the error checking is reinstated for the subsequent mouse choices. To edit the query expression, activate the grid theme created from a previous Map Query. From the Theme menu, choose Edit Theme Expression. The Map query dialog appears, with the current expression that created the grid theme displayed in the expression box. To change the criteria of the expression, highlight the portion of the expression to change, press the delete key on the keyboard, and then type in the desired criteria. To perform another expression, bring up a second Map Query dialog with Map Query in the Analysis menu. The Not button Hbefore an operator evaluates the opposite of the'operator. The Parenthesis button t } allows you to force the sequence of the evaluations within a query. By default, the expression is evaluated from left to right. However, with parentheses, the evaluation will first occur within the parenthesis and then go through the other criteria from left to right. The Update values box, when checked, will retrieve the most current values of the layer chosen in the Layers scrolling list and populate the Unique or Sample Values scrolling list. The output grid theme from Map Query is automatically named "Map Query" followed by a unique number. The grid data set associated with the output theme is written to the project's working directory, with the name "query" followed by a unique number. Use Properties in the Theme menu to find out which data set is associated with which theme. Use Properties in the Project menu to change the project's working directory. The grid data set associated with the output theme is temporary and is deleted when the theme is deleted. Use Save Data Set in the Theme menu or save the project to prevent the grid data set from being deleted when the theme is deleted. For additional help on the individual dialog choices, see Map Query (Dialog box). 18 Planning March 1999 P L A N N I N G A C T I C E magine Rhode Island in side of New Jersey. That's the best way to think about Seattle's "urban growth area" — the growth boundary surround- ing Washington's largest city, a result of the state's Growth Management Act of 1990. The four -county Central Puget Sound region encompasses about 6,000 square miles —a little less than New Jersey. The urban growth area, the UGA, is only 1,000 square miles — about the size of Rhode Is- land. Ring Around the Region It's better than latte, say fans of Washington's nine -year -old growth management law. By William Fulton Yet, although the UGA amounts to only about 15 per- cent of the region, almost 90 percent of the area's three mil- lion people live within it. The Puget Sound Regional Coun- cil reported recently that 80 percent of the new building permits issued in the four - county region in 1997 also fell within the boundary —up from 75 percent only two years be- fore. No wonder growth manage- ment advocates believe the growth law has changed life Only 10 of Washington's 39 counties are out o/ the growth management loop. The act requires plans from almost all growing counties, and some others have opted in. ■ Counties planning under Growth Management Act (GMA) IN N in metropolitan Seattle more than Windows and latter com- bined. Older neighborhoods are seeing new investment. Natu- ral areas are being protected. In some communities, higher densities —and lower parking requirements —are winning political support. "Seattle is a much more ur- N N C T I N G I C E ban place than it was five years ago," says Tracy Burrows, AICP, planning director of 1000 Friends of Washington, the statewide growth management advocacy group. Even Microsoft, traditionally housed in a sprawling campus in sub- urban Redmond, is building a neotraditional complex in Unbridled growth could have disastrous effects on the Olympic Peninsula (above) and the fertile Walla Walla Valley in southeastern Washington (left). nearby Issaquah Highlands. There are strains, though. Real estate prices are on the rise. The average house in the Seattle area costs over $220,000; one analysis rated the region 59th (out of 75) on a list of affordable metro areas. The building industry argues that the growth management law is to blame —while ac- knowledging that the economy has been so strongno one seems to care. "There hasn't been enough pain yet," says Tom McCabe, executive vice-president of the Building Industry Association of Washington. Politicians in exurban and rural areas are even more vo- cal in their complaints about the law. The next thing to sla- very, charged one county com- missioner in the sparsely popu- lated eastern part of the state. A patchwork In crafting the 1990 law, Wash- ington growth management ad- vocates say they "went to school" on the experience in Oregon, where a statewide growth management law had been in effect for almost 20 years. In fact, the Washington law was passed at the tail end of a cycle of interest in state- wide growth management, and it drew heavily as well on the experiences of such states as New Jersey and Florida. The immediate spur for the act was a far-reaching growth control initiative placed on the ballot by environmentalists in the midst of a statewide eco- nomic boom. The initiative was trounced, but only because former Gov. Booth Gardner and legislative leaders prom- ised to enact a more moderate growth management law in- stead. Before growth management, Washington's planning system resembled California's. Home rule was dominant, and unin- corporated areas were grow- ing rapidly. In the background: an active environmental com- munity that used the state's environmental review law, a mini version of the federal re- quirement, to advantage. Alike but different The basic features of the Wash- ington law are familiar to stu- dents of growth management in other states. The urban growth boundaries are remi- niscent of Oregon's. As in Florida, there is a concurrency requirement calling for public infrastructure to be in place before private development moves forward. There are also mandates to deal with public facilities, affordable housing, resource lands, and sensitive environmental areas. Unlike the laws in Oregon and Florida, however, the Washington law does not cen- tralize power in the state capi- tal. Oregon's top -down ap- proach established a statewide land -use commission that im- posed urban growth bound- aries and rigid standards on Portland and other urban ar- eas. Florida required state ap- proval of local plans. In Washington, in contrast, disputes over local plans and policies are resolved by three regional appeals, or hearings, boards, one for the Seattle area and one each for eastern and western Washington. The hearings board approach was meant to help retain Washington's tradition of home rule. "We knew the political culture of Washington," says Joseph Tovar, AICP, a former local planning director who now serves as a hearings board member in Seattle. "We knew that the system couldn't have been centralized." 20 Planning March 1999 As it turned out, the boards themselves have become tar- gets of criticism. Because the law was written quickly and its language is often vague, the boards have wound up cre- ating a huge body of common law about what growth man- agement in Washington really means —not just whether lo- cal urban growth areas should be upheld but even the very definitions of "urban" and "ru- ral." "Those first years were re- ally intense," recalls Mary McCumber, a growth manage- ment advocate who now serves as the executive director of the Puget Sound Regional Coun- cil. But the result is a much more specific set of rules than the law originally contained. "The hearing boards have written a lot of very important and very detailed decisions, with some of the leading ones written by planners," notes Gary Pivo, a longtime plan- ning professor at the Univer- sity of Washington who re- cently became associate dean of the School of Architecture at the University of Arizona. Politics as usual The law also has come up against political divisions that separate the state's urban, sub- urban, and rural areas. While the Growth Management Act is popular in Seattle and close - in suburbs, it's a contentious issue in exurban areas, where some politicians have gone so far as to call for the creation of new counties in order to evade the Seattle UGA. And the act is anathema in rural Washington —especially in the eastern parts of the state, where county commissioners have chafed under its provi- sions. Even a generally pro - growth management Chelan County commissioner com- P L A P R A pared the law to slavery dur- ing his 1996 election campaign. In large part this regional strife derives from the way Washington politics is domi- nated by metropolitan Seattle and a few other populous ar- eas. The four -county Central Puget Sound region —the third - largest metropolitan area in the West and the largest out- side California —contains more than half the state's popula- tion. If you add the smaller metro areas around Spokane, Yakima, Olympia, and Vancouver, some 75 percent of the state's 5.6 million people live in only eight counties, which together com- prise only about 20 percent of Washington's land area. With a 33 percent growth rate, Clark County —home to Vancouver, just across the Co- lumbia River from Portland, Oregon —is the fastest grow- ing county in Washington. In- deed, Vancouver has attracted so much development from growth -restricted Oregon that it has been called "Portland's dirty little secret." So far, the growth manage- ment crowd has continued to win its political battles in the Seattle area. But its successes have come at the cost of bipar- tisanship, with Democratic Gov. Gary Locke resisting changes promoted by a Re- publican legislature. Political football As in Oregon, the Washington law has been subject to con- stant attack at the ballot box. A statewide property rights ini- tiative, which would have cut into the power of the law, was soundly defeated at the polls in 1995. The state legislature has re- peatedly passed reforms to strengthen the hand of build- ers and, especially, rural coun- N N C T N I C "A recorded greeting we would like to hear. says cartoonist Hinshaw. ties. Last year, for example, the legislature approved a bill permitting rural counties to opt out of the Growth Man- agement Act. Gov. Locke ve- toed that one. "We've had a good gover- nor," says McCumber. "That seems to be a prerequisite for these things to work." Democrats effectively re- gained control of the legisla- ture in the November elec- tion. They have a majority in the senate, while the house of representatives is evenly split. So a renewed attack on the growth management law is not likely to make it to the governor's desk next year. But the issue is not going to go away. Growth management has come to be viewed on a partisan basis in Olympia, with environmentalists aligned with Democrats on one side and builders and property rights advocates aligned with Repub- licans on the other. How it plays In Seattle, the result of the Growth Management Act has been an intense focus on plan- ning issues and planning policy —not unlike what hap- pened in California in the'70s E and Florida in the '80s. The road has not always been smooth, but in general the re- gion has made progress in mov- ing toward a more regional planning approach with an em- phasis on. reinforcing existing centers. On the heavily populated eastern side of Puget Sound, the urban growth boundary meanders along the edges of dozens of existing cities, jut- ting into unincorporated ar- eas in only a few places. Al- most without exception, Seattle -area planners say the tight line has had a good ef- fect, especially in older, close - in suburbs that are grappling with the second or third gen- eration of growth. "The Growth Management Act has reinforced some of the philosophy and some of the policies that our city al- ready had," says Eric Shields, AICP, planning director of the close -in suburb of Kirkland. Other area planners point to the tremendous new invest- ment in existing downtowns — especially downtown Seattle itself, which has become posi- tively vibrant since the urban boundary was imposed. Density has also increased 21 , P L A P R A if vehicle miles traveled are a good indicator. According to the Puget Sound Regional Coun- cil, the Seattle area's popula- tion grew by 22 percent dur- ing the 1980s and another 15 percent between 1990 and 1996. Yet during those years, VMT grew by only 15 per- cent. Push to annex The Growth Management Act has also forced changes in lo- cal government organization — some good, some bad, accord- ing to growth management advocates. On the good side: The law encourages people in urban areas to live within in- corporated jurisdictions, thus pushing unincorporated areas toward incorporation or an- nexation. Since 1990, more than 46,000 acres with 100,000 people have been annexed to existing cit- ies, while nine new cities with a population of 280,000 people have been incorporated. The percentage of people living in incorporated areas has grown from 50 percent to 70 percent during that time. But on Seattle's urban fringe, the act has encouraged a dif- ferent kind of government re- organization —one that growth management advocates have vociferously opposed. In Snohomish, Pierce, and other outlying counties, politicians and property owners, holding up the home rule banner, have attempted to carve out new counties in order to gain the legal power to create their own urban growth areas. Growth management advo- cates have fought them tooth and nail, and a year ago the Washington Supreme Court ruled that the creation of new counties is a state legislative act and cannot occur without the consent of all residents of N ill I C T I the affected counties. East is cast The rhetoric is most strident in the rural counties, especially in eastern Washington, where support for property rights is strong and resentment of state requirements is rife. Many of the rural counties opted in to the growth management pro- gram shortly after it was ap- proved, lured by the promise of state funds to assist in plan- ning. Others were forced into the program later when their growth rates exceeded 10 per- cent for the first time. The ire of the rural counties peaked in 1996, when then - Gov. Mike Lowry withheld $2 million in transportation funds from Chelan County in north - central Washington because it had not complied with the act. House speaker Clyde Ballard, a Republican from Chelan County, complained about the state's "dictatorial power," and shortly before he left office in early 1997, Lowry reversed his decision. Resentment of the appeals boards is particularly high. Shane Hope, director of the growth management program for the state, says that the board for eastern Washington has a reputation for mediating dis- Le putes rather than imposing rul- ings. But that's not enough to appease eastern politicians, who argue that the board usurps their right to control growth as they see fit. "Sure, we got a lot of money, all right," says Ferry County commissioner Jim Hall, a vo- cal foe of the growth act. 'But we also got something called a hearings board." Located in northeastern Washington, Ferry is one of the state's most rural coun- ties. Its 2,200 square miles in- clude only 7,300 people and one incorporated city, appro- priately called Republic. Although there is no opt out provision in the Washington law, the state has given coun- ties like Ferry some latitude by allowing the creation of Rural Service Areas, which would allow them to permit some urban development in unincorporated areas. Ferry County has adopted a total of five square miles of rural service areas —but envi- ronmentalists have attacked their plan before the appeals board, where it is pending. Resentful of Seattle founda- tion funding for the environ- mental groups, Hall says: "A handful of people should not hold sway over Ferry County, and that's what happening." Hall's sentiments are typi- cal of rural county politicians, and they highlight perhaps the biggest problem in the Growth Management Act —the per- ceived power of urban envi- ronmentalists to control land use (and, by extension, eco- nomic growth) in struggling rural counties. D1��iI1� 2I7 In one sense, the law has been a success. It has provided a context for many older urban areas —encouraging them to move toward reinvestment, provide transit, and bolster ur- ban centers more quickly than they otherwise might have. But at the same, the law has sim- ply hardened political attitudes on both sides of the political urban boundary issue. "It's deeply political at the local level," says Pivo. The state mandate results in two kinds of plans: strong ones pre- pared by jurisdictions that would have done a good job of growth management anyway and weak ones produced by exurban jurisdictions that are highly resistant to the whole idea. "They fight it.. They ap- peal it. There's an election over it. There's litigation. And in the end they produce plans that are quite tepid." In the end, a law like Washington's can help moti- vate people to act —if they buy into the underlying planning ideas. It's clear, though, that you can't change the mind -set of a rural county commissioner simply by passing a law. William Fulton is a contributing editor of Planning and editor and publisher of California Planning & Development Report. His book Cali- fornia: Land and Legacy was re- cently published by the Westcliffe Publishing Company. �~ ¢ � ,rs�� � sx°��.s� ��4r ws r '"F � 3. � � �3�,� t� � xr �4 �`� a,, i�� d �����r �i�i 5'*� �`' �" `'t �€''�. t 3 .t � „i, � '^� `°�X�xF1aT �i f r s � _ �- ��,� �. �� � . f �� � � s. n 1: 4 � _ :� � e �. g �R �g. � � ,� t E, If� � i t 4 ,. _.._.,__�.e...._...�..�.,_ .. _.. ..:. _,_.. ' � `E � �J x � �., _ . ..� � � '�m 's fr <'� S ,�� .. �, 2 � �� -: _ =.�.� .C.R �;.$w'za�i.�—"'+:. �*`s�`::,.� �e`ER q�� ;. jai GROWTH MANAGEMENT PLANNING 225 sizes that the line between growth management and other types of land -use control is blurred. The town took (and still takes) the position that the fact that it does not allow certain housing types and therefore possibly keeps out certain types of people is not so terrible. For is it not true that the region is composed of many communities? If so, why must any one community offer housing for all types of households? If Ramapo does not permit building of, say, garden apartments, will not the builder who wishes to construct such units simply take his capital elsewhere? One could go further and say that if Ramapo severely curtails the building of single-family houses, does that not simply mean that more units will be built elsewhere. After all, no action Ramapo takes will diminish the regionwide demand for housing nor will it diminish the regionwide supply of capital and labor for building housing. There is no doubt some truth to these arguments. There are also some countera aauments. It can be argued that while Ramapo cannot diminish regionwide supplies of capital and labor it can diminish the regionwide supply of land available for development. That may elevate housing costs not only locally but regionally. If development which would have occurred in Ramapo is displaced to more peripheral communities, that may produce a kind of ineffi- ciency at the regional level because it spreads out residential and commercial activity. That pushes up commuting times and costs, makes it more difficult to supply public transportation, and increases the cost of providing utility ser- vice. In other words, it makes for suboptimal regional planning. WINNERS AND LOSERS IN GROWTH MANAGEMENT In principle many municipalities could slow growth with equal effectiveness by limiting either residential or commercial development. Slowing residential growth would slow commercial growth by limiting the size of the labor force and the number of consumers. Similarly, limiting commercial growth would slow the growth of the housing stock because the presence of jobs is a major factor in the demand for housing. In point of fact, however, almost all growth management systems place the emphasis on limiting residential growth. The reason is that such a policy tends to produce tight labor markets and high housing prices. That is much more attractive to the population already in place than a commercial limita- tion policy which would produce higher unemployment and lower housing prices. And, of course, it is the population resident at the time which estab- lishes the growth management policy. , Assume that a growth management program has the effect of slowing residential growth relative to employment grow-:h. Who wins and who loses by this effect? The homeowner wins simply through the workings of the law of 226 GnGWT^ MANAGEVEINT ?_.,A.N3 supply and demand. Restrict the supply of any item and, all other things being equal, its price rises. The owner of rental property benefits in the same man- ner. A lesser supply of rental units in the long run means higher rents and that is capitalized as a higher value for the apartment building in question. Of course, by the same token, the renter loses. The nonresident of the munici- pality, if he or she has the desire to become a resident, is a loser, for it is now more difficult to find housing in the community. In a general sense, those who own developed property in the community benefit while those who would like to own property lose. Those who would profit from community growth, for example, builders, construction workers, and real estate brokers, also tend to be losers. Owners of undevelc�,ed land within the community are likely to be losers in the process for there is a general relationship between the value of land and the intensity with which it can be developed. Restrict that intensity and the value of land is necessarily diminished. Financial effects will be felt outside the municipality as well. If town X and town Y are in the same metropolitan area, they are to some extent part of the same housing market. If town X reduces its rate of housing construction, that deflects some housing demand to town Y. Thus housing prices in town Y (as well as in X) will rise, benefiting those who already own housing there and penalizing those who seek to buy there. Comparable effects may be seen for rental property owners and renters as well. Fiscal effects can also be demonstrated. If town X restricts residential development but accepts a new corporate headquarters its tax rate may go down because the tax revenues from the headquarters exceed the new expenses the headquarters will impose upon the town. In effect, town X is capturing the tax surplus from the headquarters while shifting the population - related costs to other towns. Town Y now has to pay the cost of educating the children of people who work in town X and whose place of work contributes handsomely to town X's tax base. The "Defense of Privilege" Issue Beyond the purely financial issue of winners and losers is a larger but less demonstrable issue. Much argument over environmental and planning issues is bedeviled with the question of "defense of privilege," with charges of hypocrisy by opponents of growth management and protestations of virtue by its proponents. Without trying to pass a blanket judgment over what is really a mixed and complex situation, let us simply present an argument. There are some goods whose enjoyment by one party does not diminish the enjoyment of comparable goods by another party. If I enjoy a fine steak that does not diminish your enjoyment of another steak. On the other hand, my enjoyment of a day on the ski slope may well diminish your enjoyment of your day on the slope because my presence makes the trails and the lift lines just a bit more crowded for you. GRO`PaH MANAGEMENT P : '. , ,G 227 As the U.S. population becomes more prosperous, the possession of goods of the first type becomes less significant as a way of distinguishing between the affluent and the nonaffluent. Instead, the distinction increasingly becomes a matter of being able to enjoy goods and services of the second type — those whose value is lessened the more that others have access to the same or similar items. Increasingly wealth becomes important not because it buys consumer goods, but because it buys quiet, solitude, clean air, or access to relatively unspoiled nature. We can always produce more automobiles or more stereos, but the supply of mountain streams is fixed. If one accepts this argument it is only a short step to seeing much environmental and planning conflict in terms of the defense of privilege. The population of a prosperous, attractive community which seeks to limit growth is simply defending its privileges. It is, if one accepts this argument, seeking by means of political action to protect or enhance the value of those goods of the second type which it now enjoys. Alternatively, one might say that it is using the political process to impose losses upon outsiders, that is, denying them temporary or permanent access to the community;. An interesting aspect of this "defense of privilege" argument is to observe, in terns of social class, the line-up of combatants in fights over environmental issues. Very often business and labor (the capitalists and the proletariat, those famed adversaries in the Marxian view) will be allied in favor of development while the opposition will be largely upper middle class, perhaps as represented by a coalition of environmental groups like the Sierra Club. The line-up of players is not hard to understand. The same project which means profit to the capitalist means jobs to the construction workers and so they make common cause. The upper middle class opposition neither earns its living by investing capital nor by doing construction or industrial labor. If one accepts the "defense of privilege" argument it opposes the project for the rea- sons presented earlier.9 RECENT TRENDS IN GROWTH MANAGEMENT At present, growth' management of one sort or another is practiced by hun- dreds of local governments. A wide variety of approaches are taken. These vary with political climate, the municipality's particular situation and the state enabling legislation under which planning takes place. The outright limitation of growth —as in the Ramapo situation —is not very common, but is practiced in some places. For example, the city of Boulder, Colorado limits the number of building permits it grants to a number which it estimates will hold population growth to 2 percent per year. At one time permits were awarded by a competitive scheme. At present, all the permits 228 G=+Gvv i n MANAGEMENT PLANNING applied for are totaled and applicants receive a percentage share of their application. The city does not limit commercial growth in a comparable man- ner. Boulder also uses requirements and exactions to reimburse the muni- cipality for costs imposed by new development and to achieve, at the developer's cost, some public purposes. For example, the city requires that for developments of 10 or more units 15 percent of the units must be for low or moderate income people. Initially, this is a cost which the developer absorbs. In reality, economic theory would suggest that some of this cost is borne by the developer and some is shifted to buyers of the remaining 85 percent in the form of higher prices.lo But, in any case, it is a cost not chargeable to the city government. Exactions are also made for park and community development funds. The exactions clearly are part of the fiscal aspect of growth management noted at the beginning of the chapter. However, placing additional costs (even if doing so is entirely justifiable) upon the developer may have the effect of reducing the rate of development somewhat. That is not a matter of planning, but of economics. Increasing the production cost of any item will, in general, raise its selling price and thus reduce the amount which can be sold. The city of Davis, California also limits residential permits. In the late 1970s community residents in a citizen -originated referendum voted to limit growth so that by the year 2000 the city's population would not exceed 50,000. Every two years the planning department calculates the number of new dwell- ing units that would be consistent with not exceeding that target. Building permit applications are essentially ranked and permits are granted only to that number. The city uses a scoring system with points granted for energy efficiency, provision of low-cost units, past performance of the developer, environmental impact, design diversity, and compactness, among others. Like Boulder, Davis does not apply comparable limits to commercial development. Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in the Philadelphia metropolitan area reacted to growth pressures in a somewhat different manner. Here, the county has no direct control over local land use since, under Pennsylvania state law, zoning powers reside at the municipal level. Thus the county has only an advisory role. The county planning department designates development dis- tricts largely on the basis of projected population change. Within those dis- tricts it recommends infrastructure (such as sewer lines, water mains, and roads) to facilitate development consistent with the natural environment and expected or planned population change. It suggests that the county outside of those districts be considered a "holding zone" with land -use controls which hold population to very low density levels. This is achieved by large lot zoning requirements and tax policies which encourage farmers to keep their lands in agricultural use. u Within the development districts the county agency suggests the use of performance zoning. Specifically, the county suggests the use of density and impervious cover requirements. Rather than specifying the nature of residen- tial development in great detail, as does the conventional or "Euclidean" ordi- nance, the county will simply suggest zoning districts which specify the GRC',WH MANAGEMENT P ; ';Nt;JG 229 number of units per acre. Whether, for example, the units in question are to be single family or multifamily is a matter for community determination. The impervious cover requirements are cast in terms of percent of the site covered. The intention is to control land use in terms of what is really important (in this case population housed in an area and volume of storm water runoff) rather than to specify a large number of details of secondary importance. From a design point of view performance zoning achieves the overall goals of zoning but gives the designer far more freedom and should encourage much more interesting and varied design. It relies on the market place rather than the zoning ordinance to achieve functional, aesthetically sound development. As noted in connection with other communities, limitation is heavier on the residential than on the commercial side. While commercial develop- ment is regulated by a variety of environmental controls as well as con- ventional zoning requirements, the performance approach is applied only to residential development. Many jurisdictions have seen the growth management problem as a largely financial issue —how to provide the infrastructure for growth before growth occurs and how to pay the infrastructure costs which growth imposes. As noted in Chapter 8 an exaction is a payment a jurisdiction demands in return for permitting development to take place. Fairfax County, Virginia uses a system of "proffers," a variation on the exaction theme, which requires that developers offer to pay the infrastructure costs of major projects. Essentially, the county uses the ability to grant or deny rezonings as a means of obtaining proffers. For example, in the Fairfax Center area, roughly speaking a 3,000 acre development node in the county, the master plan recog- nizes three levels of development. There is a base level which is essentially single-family large -lot development, an intermediate level, and an overlay level. The latter permits intensive commercial and multi -family residential development. The developer who wishes a rezoning to either the intermediate or overlay level must offer to pay for the estimated infrastructure costs his development will impose on the county. In 1985 these costs were estimated at $2.83 per square foot of commercial floor space and $631 per residential unit. Outside of the Fairfax Center area the proffer system is also in use but the numbers involved are not so precisely defined. Under Virginia state law government cannot literally demand a con- tribution from a private party. Thus if the developer builds "by right," —that is, under the existing zoning —he or she cannot be compelled to contribute to infrastructure costs. However, if a rezoning is required, the county can choose not to grant the request unless a "proffer" is made. The making of the proffer is thus, in a sense, voluntary. The developer makes it in the hopes of receiving something of value in return, namely the higher profit obtainable from developing at a greater density. The county has also used the proffer system to obtain some nonstructured contributions from builders. For example, several developers have included the provision of van pooling in their proffers as a means of dealing with the increased vehicular traffic their developments can be expected to generate. 230 GROW-- MANAGEMENT PLANNING Fort Collins, Colorado uses a technique designed to direct growth into specified areas and also to require new development to pay its own infrastruc- ture costs "up front." The city is located within a county and over the years it has grown by annexation. Under the terms of a joint city -county agreement a 65-square mile "urban growth area" -has been defined. The understanding is that all land within the growth area is ultimately subject to annexation. Within this area urban services will be provided and urban development stan- dards —paved roads, public water, public sewer facilities, and the like —will apply. As urban development takes place the city annexes the area. In addition to providing necessary infrastructure on site, developers are required to provide offsite infrastructure such as roads and sewer and water lines. How much they are required to provide is determined on the basis of traffic and other studies which they themselves are required to pay for. In the Fort Collins case, rather than contribute to a development fund, the developer is literally required to provide the specified infrastructure. A subsequent developer may be required to make payments to a prior developer if he or she makes use of infrastructure the latter has provided. For example, if developer A builds a mile of road to serve his project and developer B subse- quently builds in such a manner as to make direct use of that road, then a compensating payment from B to A may be required. The city also makes much use of planned unit development. PUD applies in all newly annexed areas. In older areas developers may use either the existing traditional zoning or may apply for development under the PUD system. The city also requires that all property under single ownership be developed under a single "master plan." Note that the term "master plan" is used in a different sense than elsewhere in this book. The effect of these two approaches is to make land development much more a cooperative and negoti- ated process than it would be under traditional zoning. The planners and the developers together are able to look at the entirety of what is proposed and approve it or renegotiate it as a single entity. The Fort Collins approach, as seen by the city's planning agency, is "growth management" as opposed to "growth control" in the sense that the effort is to shape growth rather than to limit it. In fact, in the late 1970s a growth limitation initiative analogous to Boulder's was soundly defeated by Fort Collins voters. STATE LEVEL GROWTH MANAGEMENT Many states exercise considerable control over the process of growth, par- ticularly in environmentally sensitive areas. These controls constitute much of Bosselman's "quiet revolution" noted in Chapter 8. The first statewide land - use controls were instituted in Hawaii in the early 1960s. The motivation behind them was that the land area of the islands is small, growth pressures GROWTH MANAGEMENT PLANNING 231 were strong, and agriculture was important to the state economy. Specifically, according to Bosselman, the goal was to keep Honolulu, the main center of population in the state, from sprawling out Los Angeles -like into the adjacent Central Valley of Oahu. Under legislation passed in 1961 all land in the state falls into one of four major categories; urban, rural, agricultural, and con- servation. Within the urban areas county zoning regulations prevail. In effect, counties may (but do not have to) permit urban -type development in any area that the state designates as urban. In the rural and agricultural areas land uses are controlled by the State Land Use Commission, a board set up when the system was created. In the conservation district land use is controlled by the state's Board of Land and Natural Resources. Perhaps it is no surprise that the first statewide system came in Hawaii. A small, scenically beautiful state, subject to major growth pressures, and having a limited supply of highly productive agricultural land would appear to be an ideal candidate for such a system. The fact that much of the growth pressure came from outsiders, people from the U.S. mainland, may also have contributed somewhat to the passage of the act. Partly as a result of the limitation on urban growth Hawaii is charac- terized by very high housing prices. But is that bad? The person who already owns property in the state is likely to take a very different view than the person who lives on the mainland but thinks it would be nice to buy a con- dominium in Honolulu to which he or she will someday retire. Again, we see that planning decisions, no matter how well intended, create winners and losers. The state of Vermont instituted a land -use control system in 1970 for somewhat similar reasons. The state's scenic beauty, what many believe to be the best ski areas east of the Mississippi, and its proximity to population concentrations in the New York, Boston, and Montreal areas made it a major locus for second -home development in the 1960s. Concerned about the threat to its physical environment, the state enacted a system of land -use controls which survives to the present time with only minor modification. The entire state is divided into 7 districts. Within each district, no land subdivision involving 10 or more lots may be made without commission approval. In addition, no land development plans at elevations of 2,500 feet or more, even if only involving a single lot, may proceed without commission approval. The elevation standard exists to protect environmentally fragile hillsides and ridges which are also the areas most likely to be the sites of resort and second home development. To grant a permit, the commission must find that a wide range of planning considerations, both environmental and otherwise, are satisfied. These include absence of undue air and water pollution effects, availability of sufficient water, absence of significant erosion effect, absence of significant highway congestion or safety hazard, absence of excessive burden on the local educational system, absence of excessive burden on local government services, absence of undue effect on scenic values, historic sites or rare or irreplaceable natural areas, conformity with statewide land -use plans, and conformity with local land -use plans. 232 GROWTH MANAGEMENT PLANNING The state has not yet enacted a land -use plan. However, it has adopted a Capability and Development Plan which contains data on land use and a statement of goals and objectives regarding statewide land -use patterns. It might be regarded as a precursor of a state plan. The stipulation regarding conformity with local land -use plans means that the work of the commissions does not supersede local planning efforts. However, the existence of the com- missions means that even if localities fail to plan, or if their plans give little or no concern to environmental goals, those goals still have a guardian. Numerous other states have some statewide controls over land use. Frequently, the control does not extend to the entire state, but rather to areas of special concern. For example, many states have permit requirements for coastal zones. This is in recognition of the fragility and ecological value of such zones. They are fragile in that beaches exist in an equilibrium between sand removal and sand deposition by currents and wave action. Development which changes this equilibrium can make major changes in the shape of the shoreline. Tidal areas are ecologically valuable because they form the breeding grounds of many species and because they often hold large quantities of nutrients upon which many species are dependent. Many states also control development in wetlands. Freshwater wetlands, like salt water marshes, are important "nutrient traps" and are important as habitats and breeding grounds for many species. Development in wetlands may also increase flood hazards elsewhere by increasing the rate of stormwater runoff. Many states also exercise some development controls over areas of particular scenic or historic value. The state of Florida faces serious environmental problems in several regards. Its population growth has been extremely rapid in the last several decades and is likely to continue at a brisk pace for the foreseeable future. Its swampy areas are environmentally fragile, as is often the case with tropical soils. Its ground water supplies are readily threatened by salt water intrusion because much of the state lies very close to sea level.12 In 1972, after considerable lobbying by environmental groups, the state legislature passed the Environmental Land and Water Management Act, as well as several ancillary pieces of legislation. In "Areas of Critical State Concern" and on "Developments of Regional Impact" the state can overrule local land -use decisions if those decisions fail to take into account effects which extend beyond the locality's boundaries.13 DeGrove quotes the key language of the legislation defining areas of critical state concern as: 1. An area containing, or having significant impact upon, environmental, histor- ical, natural, or archeological resources of statewide importance. 2. An area significantly affected by, or having significant effect upon, an existing or proposed major public facility or other area of major public investment. I A proposed area of major development potential, which may include a proposed site of a new community, designated in a state land development plan. GROWTH MANAGEMENT PLANNING 233 The "new community" provision is particularly germane to Florida because much of Florida's population has been accommodated in major new developments, frequently carved out of environmentally sensitive former wil- derness. Developments of Regional Impact are defined as projects which "because of [their] character, magnitude or location, would have a substantial effect on the health, safety or welfare of the citizens of more than one county." Thus, for example, a regional shopping center which would affect the pattern of vehicular traffic in adjacent counties could be classified as being of regional impact. So, too, could a power plant or industrial facility whose emissions could have measureable effects on the air quality in adjacent counties. The legislation thus gives the state broad powers to impose regulation and control where statewide interests are at stake. State controls are not likely to require localities to permit that which they do not wish to permit. Rather, they will from time to time prevent or modify that which localities would be inclined to permit. In that sense they add a layer of control rather than sub- stitute for local controls. As is true of all land -use controls, the ultimate arbiters of exactly what the words in the legislation mean in regard to specific cases are the courts. GROWTH MANAGEMENT —PRO OR CON? In the writer's view one cannot make a blanket judgment about growth man- agement. Like any planning technique it is subject to use and misuse. At its best, it can be used to step into the future in a planned manner and emerge with good results —with a sensible and attractive pattern of development, with the public treasury in good shape, with community services adequate to the tasks demanded of them, and with the natural environment disrupted to a minimal degree. At worst, growth management techniques can be used to block legitimate growth, to use the powers of government to defend the priv- ileges of those already privileged, and to displace the inevitable costs of development to other jurisdictions. Quite probably, the best social and economic results will be obtained where the government doing the managing corresponds roughly in size to a natural labor market or housing market. If the primary purpose of the growth management system is environmental, it seems likely that, all other things being equal, the best results will be obtained if there is a correspondence between the physical jurisdiction of the managing unit and the realities of the environmental processes. In this case the displacement effects of growth man- agement decisions will be taken account of to a substantial degree. On the other hand. if the jurisdiction is small with regard to the economic, social, or physical effects resulting from its actions, the temptation to consider only parochial interests and to ignore the numerous effects of local decisions on outsiders may be hard to resist. 234 GROWTH MANAGEMENT PLANNING SUMMARY NOTES Growth management is often defined as the regulation of the amount, timing, location, and character of development. Growth management programs gener- ally use techniques which are common to much of planning. Thus such plans are distinguished from more traditional plans by their intent and scope, rather than by the implementing techniques they use. Growth management programs became widespread in the 1960s as a result of reaction to the rapid suburbanization of the post war period and the growth of environmental consciousness and concern. Such programs raise a variety of equity issues, for controlling the rate and character of growth inev- itably produces a variety of winners and losers, a point discussed in some detail in the chapter. One of the earlier and best-known growth management plans was that. adopted by Ramapo, New York. The town used a point system covering such items as sewers, drainage, roads, and public facilities to determine when a building permit might be granted. The stated goal was to limit the pace of development to match the provision of public infrastructure. The ordinance was challenged in court but ultimately sustained. The chapter described a number of subsequent growth management plans in various parts of the coun- try. Some, such as BouIder's or Davis's, attempt to place a cap on growth or to hold growth to some predetermined annual percentage rate. Others, such as Fort Collins's, seek to shape the pattern of growth without attempting to limit the rate. A considerable number of states have instituted growth management programs, beginning with Hawaii in the early 1960s. In general, state growth management programs cover only parts of the state. frequently for environ- mental reasons. State controls on development usually do not supersede local controls. Rather, they constitute an additional level of control intended to see that larger -than -local consideration and issues are given adequate weight in the making of development decisions. 1. Randall W. Scott et al., eds., Management and Control of Growth, Urban Land Institute, Washington, D.C., 1975. Three volumes appeared in 1975. Two more have since appeared. 2. See articles by Wilbur Thompson and Willard R. Johnson in Vol. I, Scott, Op. Cit. 3. One might ask what sources of air pollution purely residential development involves. Accord- ing to EPA estimates about one half of U.S. air pollution comes from motor vehicle exhausts. Thus the vehicular traffic associated with residential development is a major source of air pollution. Smaller amounts of air pollution may come from home heating systems. In some areas of the country, for example Denver, Colorado, emissions from wood burning stoves have been a major source of air pollution. 4. William Alonso, "Urban Zero Population Growth", Daedalus, Vol. 102, No.4, Fall 1973, pp. 191-206. The article is reprinted in Scott. Op. Cit., Vol. I, Chapter 5. GRC'PrH MANAGEMENT :`1 NNING 235 5. Ernest F. Schumacher, Small is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People .Mattered, Harper & Row, New York, 1975. (Previously published in the U.K.) 6. The plan was enacted because of strong growth pressures in the New York region during the 1950s and 1960s. At the end of the 1960s regional growth slowed and growth pressures abated, greatly reducing the need for growth management. In the early 1980s, believing that it had sufficient other land use control mechanisms, the town rescinded the ordinance. 7. For background and details of the plan, see Israel Stollman, "Ramapo: An Editorial and Ordinance as Amended," Scott, Op. Cit., vol. 2, pp. 5-14. 8. David W. Silverman, "A Return to Walled Cities: Ramapo as an Imperium in Imperio," Scott, Op. Cit., Vol. 2, pp. 52-61. Urban Land Institute. 1975, Vol II, pp 52-61. See, also Golden v Planning Board of Ramapo, 285 N.E.2d 29111972). Quoted on pages 14-25 of Scott, Op. Cit. 9. In regard to the class aspects of environmental conflict the reader might want to look into the concept of the "new class." For a set of essays on the subject see The :Vew Class, R. Bruce - Briggs, ed., Transaction Books, New York, 1979. For a presentation of the view that environ- mental controls have been used to defend privilege see The Environmental Protection Hustle, Bernard J. Frieden, MIT Press, Cambridge, :Mass., 1979. 10. The reader interested in the shifting of costs to parties other than those who pay them directly can pursue the matter in most introductory enonomics tests under the heading of "tax inci- dence." 11. Many counties in or near metropolitan areas use preferential tax treatment to keep land in agricultural use. In general, this means taxing it at a rate which is appropriate to its value in agricultural use. rather than its market value as sold for nonagricultural use, say residential or commercial development. 12. In low lying areas near the sea a drop in the water table, caused by excessive use of ground water or a reduction in surface water available for aquifer recharge, will cause salt water from the ocean to move in. This can cause change in vegetation and wild life and also render ground water unfit for drinking. 13. For details see Land, Growth and Politics, John M. DeGrove, American Planning Association, Chicago, 1984, Chapter 4. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY BL-RROws, LAWRENCE B., Growth Management: GODSCHALK, DAVID R., Constitutional Issues of Issues, Techniques and Policy Implications, Cen- Growth Management, Planners Press, Revised ter for Urban Policy Research, Rutgers, N.J., ed., 1979. Washington, D.C. 1978. Scary, RANDALL W., et. al., eds., .Management DEGROVE, JOHN M., Land, Growth and Politics, and Control of Growth, Urban Land Institute, Planners Press, Washington, D.C., 1984. Washington. D.C., 1975 and subsequent years.