Yoking Form-Based Codes and Historic Districts

By Philip Walker, AICP

The Historic Beaufort Foundation was alarmed. Facing the impending adoption of a citywide form-based code, the foundation hired a consultant to help avoid the potential negative consequences to the community's historic districts. That was in 2011. Now, nearly three years later, it appears there will be a happy ending. (More about that later.)

With an international reputation for its rich collection of historic architecture nestled in a beautiful coastal setting, Beaufort, South Carolina, has been the backdrop for several movies, including The Big Chill, Glory, and The Great Santini. (Beaufort's Historic District also was named a Great Neighborhood by APA in 2013.)

Beaufort's downtown is designated as a National Historic Landmark District, the highest level of historic and architectural significance. The city adopted local historic district regulations in 1972, and those regulations are implemented by the Historic District Review Board in accordance with adopted design guidelines. However, many in the development community have labeled this preservation program cumbersome and unpredictable; they blame it for discouraging reinvestment within the district.

As an unquestionably forward-thinking community, Beaufort has conducted high-level comprehensive planning during the past decade, producing a 2009 comprehensive plan entitled Vision Beaufort. That plan proposed numerous smart-growth strategies, even mapping the community into a series of transect zones based on physical form and character.

Then the city decided to go the extra mile: It would implement the plan using a variety of tools, including a new zoning and development code. After researching form-based codes, the city settled on a community-wide FBC. Beaufort had already experimented with small-scale FBCs in two redevelopment districts near the downtown and the positive reviews seemed to outweigh the negative.

The targeted FBCs and major infrastructure investments have yielded several new compatible housing units. In the minds of some community residents, the FBC looked like it might outlast the local historic district program — raising the question of whether an FBC and historic district overlay can peacefully coexist.

Birth of a code

According to the Form-Based Code Institute, "Form-based codes foster predictable built results and a high-quality public realm by using physical form (rather than separation of uses) as the organizing principle for the code. ... They are regulations, not mere guidelines, adopted into city or county law alternative to conventional zoning."

FBCs are more effective than conventional zoning in addressing the relationship between the public and private realms; the form and mass of buildings; and the scale and design of streets, lots, and blocks. FBCs also tend to feature much more liberal use of graphics and less text because, as most planners are keenly aware by now, FBCs are distinct in their focus on physical form instead of land uses.

The earliest FBCs were applied to master planned communities in undeveloped areas. Today, "form-based codes have come in from the greenfields and are being applied to existing communities," says Jim Lindberg, planning director of the Preservation Green Lab in the Denver office of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Adding to the ease of using FBCs was the creation of the SmartCode in 2003. Prepared by the Miami firm of Duany Plater-Zyberk, this document essentially allows communities to "calibrate" a generic FBC to fit unique design characteristics. While there are some innovative features in the SmartCode and similar FBCs, it can be argued that their genesis lies in historic district guidelines that have existed since Charleston established the country's first local historic district in 1931.

The primary difference is that historic district guidelines are applied as a design review "overlay" district that is superimposed over the underlying "base" zoning, leaving all land-use and density provisions of the base zoning intact. Design-related standards supersede those of the underlying zoning, including building setback and height requirements. In contrast, FBCs become the new base zoning by addressing land use and design in a more comprehensive and integrated manner, with use issues taking a back seat to physical form.

FBCs seem to be spreading fast. For planners who support a smart-growth philosophy, this trend is positive. The common thinking in today's planning world is that FBCs are a highly effective tool for implementing smart-growth policies. In reality, they could just as easily be used to effect sprawl, but I have not come across any instances of the latter. In some cases, FBCs have been adopted for entire communities, while in others they have been applied only to specific locations, such as downtowns, new town centers, and commercial corridors.

Communities adopting FBCs — either citywide or over a broad area — range in size from Pass Christian, Mississippi (pop. 5,000), and Leander, Texas (pop. 27,000), to Miami, Denver, and Cincinnati. While more than 300 FBCs have been adopted across the U.S., the total accounts for less than 0.2 percent of our nation's communities, according to Kaizer Rangwala, AICP, writing in the April–May 2013 issue of Better! Cities & Towns. Still, other communities have rejected them, including Columbia, Tennessee, whose FBC was drafted in 2011, but has yet to be approved. 

'Kind-of-sort-of'

While there is debate over what constitutes a "hybrid code," this type of code seems to be popular among communities not quite ready to jump into the FBC world with both feet. Such a code might emphasize physical form and have many of the characteristics of FBCs, but also pay attention to land-use issues. In at least some instances, hybrids treat certain geographic areas with FBC provisions and other areas with conventional zoning.

Hybrids often use more text than a "pure" FBC in order to address issues that are difficult to cover with graphics. That was the approach taken by the city of Northport, Alabama, in 2008. Following closely on the heels of the community's freshly adopted Downtown and Riverfront Plan, The Walker Collaborative (my firm) was hired to craft a hybrid code for Northport's urban core and waterfront. Existing conditions include a historic downtown, undeveloped riverfront area, a light-industrial district, historic residential neighborhoods, and portions of a strip commercial corridor. While no locally designated historic districts have been adopted in Northport, the district created for the historic downtown via the hybrid code does feature several preservation-minded provisions to protect existing buildings, avoid inappropriate alterations, and yield compatible infill.

While Northport's code stresses physical form and design character, and features detailed and illustrated design standards, the various districts are based on a combination of land uses, density, and character. According to former Northport planning director Katherine Ennis, AICP, "a form-based code in its pure form would not have flown politically in Northport because it would have been too radically different from the existing zoning." It helped, she added, that the new code was adopted as part of a master planning process that had introduced the public to many of the codes design concepts.

The best option

According to Carol Wyant, the outgoing director of the Form-Based Code Institute (who is also the past director of the Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois and of statewide partnerships with the National Trust for Historic Preservation), most historic areas could use both a historic district overlay and a form-based code. However, given the political hurdles to adopting either tool, this scenario is not always realistic. So when should a community pursue a local historic district and when should it pursue an FBC?

When historic districts are the best tool. While FBCs may be able to trace their bloodlines to historic district guidelines, they are an inadequate substitute for historic district overlay zoning for a community's most important historic areas. "I would never recommend that form-based codes should completely replace historic districts in locations worthy of historic district regulations, but they can be a very complementary tool and make the preservation effort more objective," notes Daniel Parolek, principal of California-based Opticos Design and a leading practitioner of FBCs. 

Wyant adds this: "I agree that for historic districts, particularly those with major contributing buildings, it is important to retain the historic commission oversight." The key drawback of FBCs for a community's most significant areas is that they are not intended to address changes to existing buildings, including prohibiting or discouraging their demolition. 

When considering alterations to existing buildings visible from a public street, historic district design guidelines normally cover an extensive range of issues, including compatible additions, the treatment of doors and windows, architectural detailing, materials, roof penetrations, and maintenance. With the occasional exception of building additions, FBCs address none of those issues for existing buildings. Therefore, existing buildings may wind up with inappropriate alterations that degrade their design integrity and character.

While FBCs might indirectly discourage demolition because a replacement building often cannot be much larger than the one demolished (per the code), there are no explicit preservation provisions. "When we use form-based codes, for the most part, people want to redevelop," says Lee Einsweiler, principal of Code Studio, an Austin, Texas, planning firm. "People are not looking to preserve what they have."

In theory, preservation provisions could be integrated into an FBC. In reality, enabling legislation in most states prohibits such language within a community's base zoning and instead allows it only for special design overlays. Even FBCs without preservation provisions can clash with state enabling laws, Einsweiler says.

Yet another shortcoming of relying solely on FBCs is that doing so would preclude a community from attaining Certified Local Government status. Every state historic preservation office oversees its state's CLG program, which requires certified local governments to operate a comprehensive preservation program, including historic zoning, design guidelines, and a design review process. CLG communities are eligible for annual grants for various preservation projects, but municipalities opting solely for an FBC approach to protect historic areas would not qualify.

When FBCs are the best tool. Historic district overlays can come with their own set of problems: poorly written design guidelines, untrained staff, and unqualified review body members. As noted by Craig Lewis, AICP, of the Lawrence Group's North Carolina office, "many historic district guidelines have relatively weak standards for infill development, as is the case with Beaufort."

Practitioners familiar with the operations of design review boards have seen at least some of them fail to consult their guidelines or reference them when deciding on applications. Also, the wiggle room often purposely written into design guidelines to give the review body flexibility can undermine the predictability that applicants seek.

Even when the stars align — effective design guidelines implemented by well-trained staff and qualified board members — historic districts rarely include more than five percent of a community's existing structures, according to Lindberg of the National Trust. Just 3.6 percent of existing structures in New York City are locally landmarked.

At the other end of the size spectrum is Siloam Springs, Arkansas (pop. 15,000). Although the city has a historic downtown overlay zone, the provisions are somewhat vague, and more rigorous standards won't fly politically. The city's 2008 comprehensive plan suggested the adoption of an FBC, but rather than pursue a citywide FBC, Siloam Springs is taking a different tack. Senior planner Ben Rhoads, AICP, says the strategy "is to start on a small scale, like downtown, and see if it works; if so, we can then explore going citywide with a form-based code." One of the key tasks of the city's upcoming downtown and connectivity plan will be to explore whether to adopt an FBC for downtown. 

Many municipalities are unwilling or unable to fund enough staff to administer the design review process for numerous historic districts. For the past few years, Pittsburgh has relied on a single staff person to provide all of the support needed to administer 12 local historic districts and 87 individual landmark properties, in addition to all the other historic preservation responsibilities of the city. In that respect, historic district guidelines stand in stark contrast to FBCs, which are sufficiently prescriptive to be implemented administratively by a single staff person.

The murky case of infill. For historic areas without historic designations, FBCs are preferable to conventional zoning. FBCs can discourage demolition because the development that would replace a demolished building would likely be of a similar scale and form — hardly a financial gain. In addition, FBCs can ensure somewhat compatible infill development and possibly very compatible development. But with respect to infill development, how do FBCs measure up to historic zoning? The answer lies in the amount of work put into the drafting of either of these regulatory tools.

Some historic design guidelines are quite prescriptive in terms of site planning, setbacks, heights, form, and architecture. Many instead feature more open-ended contextual provisions that rely on the physical characteristics of neighboring historic structures to determine the new building's design features, including front setbacks, heights, rhythm of doors and windows, roof forms, and materials. The quantifiable standards that are applied to infill lots, such as building heights and setbacks, are based on the numeric average of the flanking buildings or the average of the entire block face.

This approach to infill is the typical result when budgets are too small to fund historic design guidelines that prescribe more exact standards. In such cases, it's harder for applicants to gauge whether their proposals will stack up and the compatibility of the resulting development lies largely in the hands of the approving review board. "There can be unlimited opinions on whether a particular building is truly contextual, making the review process very subjective and unpredictable," says Parolek.

FBCs, on the other hand, prescribe the design features based on the building's location, building type, and associated standards. They focus primarily on building form and site-planning issues such as frontages, while avoiding dictating architectural styles and details. A lot of work goes into crafting these standards for infill development, which allows them to be prescriptive enough to be implemented administratively. 

When Opticos drafts an FBC, it starts with a documentation and analysis phase. Parolek describes a process in which they "carefully document existing conditions through field work and photography, the creation of photo boards, and the targeting of characteristics that define an area."

The firm also creates numerous maps, including figure ground maps illustrating building footprints that will help the team "extract the DNA that makes the area unique." Although this labor-intensive documentation can contribute greatly toward the large budgets that frequently accompany FBC projects, much of it can also be delegated to municipal staff and public stakeholders if sufficient oversight is provided by experts. That approach can also generate stronger public buy-in for the code.

When used in tandem. Can FBCs work in tandem with historic district standards? Absolutely they can. Nashville, Tennessee, has engaged in thoughtful planning based on new urbanist principles ever since the arrival of planning director Rick Bernhardt, FAICP, in 2000. After several years of applying urban design overlays that function essentially as form-based codes to targeted planning areas, an FBC was applied to 866 acres of downtown Nashville in 2010.

The term "form-based code" was dropped early in the process and replaced with "downtown code" because, according to Joni Priest — a planner and urban designer with the metro government's planning department — the term form-based code "created political difficulties." Despite the name change, "it is everything that a form-based code is," she adds.

Back to Beaufort

What will be the outcome in Beaufort? It appears that things will work out: The city is applying its historic overlay zoning where most needed and a new citywide code as the base zoning. Opticos created the initial draft code as a pure FBC, but the city has since settled on a hybrid code that uses more conventional zoning techniques in certain locations.

The Lawrence Group is leading the final stage of writing the code and shepherding it toward adoption. As that firm's Craig Lewis notes, many of the infill development standards already existing in the historic district guidelines have been integrated into the draft FBC, but the Historic District Review Board will remain intact to implement the historic overlay districts.

Some lessons: First, while not always the perfect solution, historic overlay districts are the best tool for protecting the integrity of a community's most significant areas. Where applied, however, they should be implemented using solid design guidelines, trained staff, and qualified review body members. Secondly, a form-based code is the best alternative for historic areas for which an overlay district is not a realistic option.

Communities considering the adoption of an FBC should be prepared for a serious educational and public relations effort, perhaps best served by starting with a geographically targeted FBC to achieve an adequate comfort level before launching into a citywide FBC. Finally, the best of all worlds for the most important places is to employ both tools in tandem. As the FBCI's Carol Wyant says, "It's not a matter of one or the other, but both."

Philip Walker is the principal of The Walker Collaborative, a planning firm based in Nashville, Tennessee. In 2011 he was hired by the Historic Beaufort Foundation to determine the potential impacts of replacing the city's local historic zoning overlay with a citywide form-based code. 

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Resources

Images: Top — The South Carolina city of Beaufort is known for its historic homes and neighborhoods. Now city leaders are wondering how to combine its historic districts with a form-based code. Bottom — The Bladen Street Redevelopment District is one of two ares where Beaufort is experimenting with form-based codes before adopting a hybrid form-based code citywide. Photos courtesy Lawrence Group.

Secretary of the Interior's Standards and Guidelines for Historic Rehabilitation: www.nps.gov/tps/standards.htm

National Park Service Certified Local Government Program: www.nps.gov/clg

National Alliance of Preservation Commissions: https://napcommissions.org

National Center for Preservation Technology & Training: www.ncptt.nps.gov

ational Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP): www.preservationnation.org

State Historic Preservation Offices: Each state government has a SHPO responsible for carrying out the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966.

Form-Based Code Institute: www.formbasedcodes.org

Congress for the New Urbanism: www.cnu.org

Smart Growth America: www.smartgrowthamerica.org