New Neighborhood Code

Traditional neighborhood development:

• Broadens the choices of neighborhood settings, lot sizes, and housing types and styles for current and future residents.
• Offers a setting where building entry level and middle market housing for residents can be economically viable.
• Slows urban sprawl, with compact neighborhoods that offer more options for housing and business locations closer to the places people work and do their errands.
• Uses less land, energy, materials, and natural resources, compared to the same amount of development in a suburban or rural setting.
• Preserves farmland and open space, by having an alternative to new residential subdivisions and frontage lots in rural areas.
• Reduces dependence on a car, and encourages walking and using public transit.
• Creates less traffic than conventional development, by being closer to workplaces, shopping centers, and services, than development in outlying areas.
• Creates a critical mass to support local-serving shops, restaurants, and other businesses; and more frequent TCAT service.
• Is built to share the strong sense of place and community that many suburban and urban neighborhoods built before the mid-20^th have.

The New Neighborhood Code makes it easier to build a diverse range of housing types, from single family houses to loft apartment buildings, and what some call missing middle housing in between — like smaller single family houses, two-flats, paired houses and fourplexes, townhouses, co-living houses, and live-work housing. 

The NNC can’t control the cost of labor or building materials, but it can help builders and developers use those resources more efficiently.  Smaller lots, less road and utility line length for each housing unit, and less land devoted to parking all help lower building costs, compared to conventional suburban development.

Owner-occupied detached houses can have a small accessory dwelling unit (ADU) or in-law apartment by right.  An ADU provides affordable housing for the tenant, and the rental income helps the owner pay their mortgage.  A tiny house can be an ADU if it meets building code requirements, has permanent utility connections, and doesn’t have wheels or a trailer chassis.

The New Neighborhood Code has reasonable architectural standards, to ensure each building contributes to a harmonious community fabric.  Standards address type and use of different exterior materials, trim, roof form, window and door area, blank wall length, mechanical equipment and service area screening, and garage location.  Architecture can be traditional or contemporary; design standards don’t impose specific styles.  However, the NNC doesn’t allow houses or other buildings that could look too plain, body, or utilitarian  It also doesn’t allow chain or franchise-style architecture.

The New Neighborhood Code also has design standards for landscaping, parking, fences, and utility and service area screening.  All utilities in a TND must be underground.

The New Neighborhood Code indirectly protects farmland and natural resources in outlying areas, by redirecting development to more compact settings closer to the City of Ithaca and existing developed areas.  The NNC also requires a variety of parks throughout a TND.  The NNC recommends placing parks and preserves in areas with natural features like creeks, ponds, and wooded areas. 

Conventional or “Euclidean” zoning, like what the Town has now, is based on separating different uses and development densities.  Conventional zoning focuses on individual lots, and the location, intensity, and impacts of uses and buildings.   It accommodates different uses by separating them from each other, and limiting them to certain zones.

A form-based zoning code uses neighborhood character and building form as its organizing principle.  A form-based code addresses the form of buildings, streets, and public places, and the relationships between them.  For example, it considers how buildings line up with each other to frame streets and public spaces, and the types and usage of building elements that contribute to attractive and lively streets.  It accommodates different uses and site features by considering how they complement their surroundings.  Form-based zoning also aims to use land efficiently.

Form-based codes are easier to use than a conventional zoning code.   The New Neighborhood Code was written and arranged with user friendliness in mind.  Like anything new and different, though, there can be a learning curve for those used to working with a conventional zoning code.

The New Neighborhood Code uses graphics, tables, bulleted lists, and plain English in the active voice to explain its standards.  Text in the code is at a 9^th grade (freshman) reading level, with no legalese.  Because some jargon is unavoidable, an illustrated glossary explains most “plannerese”. 

The New Neighborhood Code is arranged by development scale and topic – from designing a neighborhood down to building on a lot, and what uses can be on a lot.  Each chapter starts with a “how to” guide.  Regulations are laid out in a step-by-step approach, like a recipe or instructions for ready-to-assemble furniture.  Those using the code won’t have to page through a lot of unrelated information to find the rules that apply to their project, or deal with surprise regulations tucked away in some unrelated chapter or section. 

The New Neighborhood Code has four new zones, called neighborhood transect (NT) zones.  Transect zones reflect slices across a range of human habitat, with a gradual transition from the least dense to most developed parts of a neighborhood.  Transect zone names describe the development character of the area.

The New Neighborhood Code defines 16 different building types.  Permitted building types, lot size, and building height and placement vary, depending on the transect zone.

• Detached house (1,500 ft²/ ±140 m² gross living area or larger)
• Small detached house (smaller than 1,500 ft² / ±140 m²)
• Duplex (both housing units have the same owner)
• Paired house (side-by-side duplex where each side has a separate owner)
• Cottage court (group of small detached houses around a central courtyard)
• Multi-unit / collective house (building that looks like a large house, with co-housing or 3 or 4 apartments/condos)
• Townhouse (row of houses connected by party walls)
• Small apartment building (building with 5 to 12 apartments/condos)
• Apartment building (building with 13 or more apartments/condos)
• Courtyard apartment building (building with 13 or more apartments/condos, with a central courtyard)
• One story storefront building (one story building for a shop, restaurant, office, or similar use)
• Mixed use storefront building (building with storefronts on the ground floor, and offices, hotel rooms, or apartments on upper floors)
• Commercial building (building with or without storefronts, built just for commercial uses)
• Large footprint building (building with a supermarket or other larger retail or commercial use on the ground floor)
• Neighborhood service station (gas station/convenience store, with the building in front, and fuel pumps in the back)
• Civic building (school, place of worship, community center, or building for another specific civic use)

A subdivision plat will assign a specific building type for each lot. For example, if a subdivision assigns a lot for a row of townhouses, someone can only build townhouses and related outbuildings (like garages or garden sheds) on it; not an apartment building, duplex, or something else.  This ensures that a new neighborhood will have a variety of building and housing types, and residents know what kinds of buildings will go up nearby. Building type assignments aren’t permanent, so a TND can evolve naturally with time, just like older neighborhoods in the City of Ithaca and elsewhere.

To rezone land for TND, the Town Board would adopt a regulating plan. A regulating plan is a master plan showing the location and types of transect zones, streets, parks, civic uses, and other features.

A regulating plan can apply to a property with one owner, or a group of adjacent properties with different owners. Neighborhood design standards in the New Neighborhood Code will ensure the area is planned as a unified whole. If one property owner wants to plan and develop a TND before neighboring property owners are ready, the NNC allows a smaller partial TND.  The layout of a partial TND must have provisions to make it a seamless part of any future neighboring TND.

The New Neighborhood Code requires a charrette for projects over 20 acres, or smaller projects that might benefit from a collaborative design process.  A charrette is an open and collaborative multi-day workshop, where a professional design team works with stakeholders and residents to creates a plan for a TND project. The resulting plan is advisory, but it must be workable and buildable, and follow NNC neighborhood design standards.  A regulating plan (see the question above) should closely follow the plan from the charrette.

Any Planning Board and Town Board public hearing involving a new TND will allow public participation, as with a large subdivision or housing development today,

The New Neighborhood Code prescribes architecture, landscaping, screening, and parking design standards. This provides more certainty than with conventional development, where design requirements are often negotiated and applied on a case-by-case basis.

Because the New Neighborhood Code has clear, prescriptive, yet flexible standards, fewer types of planning or development actions need Planning Board approval compared to conventional zoning. For projects that need Planning Board approval, the New Neighborhood Code’s standards will make decision making easier and more predictable. 

Give us a call (607) 273-1747, or stop by Town Hall. The Town of Ithaca Planning Department is open from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM, Monday through Friday. You can also email us at planning@town.ithaca.ny.us