By Jamin Kimmell, AICP; Lydia Ness; and Rachel Cotton, AICP - Cascadia Partners

Many communities across the west have experienced an unprecedented spike in housing prices in the COVID-19 era. Untethered from offices in larger cities, many high-wage workers were drawn to smaller towns with lower housing prices. And the supply chain disruptions caused by the crisis further upended the building industry, driving up the cost of construction.

The permanency of these trends is unclear. But the housing issues caused by the pandemic only worsened pre-existing conditions. Many communities have long experienced a deep mismatch between the housing stock they have, and the housing stock they need.

We work in communities across the mountain west and the west coast, including Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, and California. We see a similar cluster of housing challenges in many places: a lack of quality rental units, aging single-family houses, and new construction that caters to higher incomes.

Outdated and inflexible zoning is just one factor that contributes to these issues. Yet it is the factor over which planners have the most influence. The approach to zoning reform will vary by community and there is a deep well of resources available to help communities decide the approach.1

Changing zoning does require, however, overcoming a range of objections that will inevitably arise. Whether rezoning a greenfield site or rewriting the rules for infill, many residents will fear the consequences of change.

This article lays out some of the more difficult objections for planners to navigate. We explain some of the underlying misconceptions or misplaced concerns that animate these objections, then suggest some strategies for responding to them. If planners can better understand and anticipate these objections, zoning reform has a better chance of success.

Density and Affordability

The dynamics of density, home size, affordability, and the housing market are probably not something your residents think about often. To most people, these topics are abstract, complex, and unfamiliar.

Most people will rely on their own lived experiences to make sense of housing prices. In smaller communities, the affordable forms of housing are usually older or rundown, manufactured homes, or publicly subsidized housing. Yet, zoning is focused on regulating the creation of new housing.

Most people have little to no personal experience with new privately built housing that is affordable. Most new housing built in their community has likely been some of the most expensive housing in town. For this reason, many residents find it difficult to understand how zoning changes will result in housing that is more affordable.

Objection: Higher density housing won’t be more affordable. Why should we allow it here?

Responding to this objection requires planners to be willing to invest time in education and communication. It is most important to understand the basic concepts in play. There are two primary reasons why higher densities can support affordability:

Allows for land and construction costs to be spread across more units, which in turn reduces the minimum sale price or rent needed to make a project financially feasible.
Encourages smaller units, which are usually lower priced. When land is constrained, but more units are allowed, a developer will often choose to reduce the size of each unit up to a point where the units remain marketable.

*Image 1: We prepared this graphic for Milwaukie, Oregon, to illustrate how more units on the same site, enabled by changes to zoning standards, results in more affordable housing options.*

Not all new, higher density housing is guaranteed to be affordable to your typical resident. Yet, higher density allowances can have positive effects on the health of the overall housing market even if the new housing is relatively expensive.

Higher density allowances can make development feasible on sites it would otherwise not be feasible, and thus increase overall housing stock. A larger pool of new units can relieve pressure for higher income households to bid up prices on older housing stock, allowing lower or moderate-income households to occupy those units.2

Character and Compatibility

Many objections to zoning changes center on the aesthetic character of the community. Residents, particularly homeowners, are often resistant to new housing they perceive as incompatible with their neighborhood.

These objections are often rooted in misperceptions about what the new housing will look and feel like. Again, it is critical to take the perspective of the lived experience of residents in your community. Are there many examples of well-designed multi-family housing, townhouses, or cottage courts in your community?

In many smaller towns and suburbs, the existing examples of these housing types may be poorly designed, low quality, or undermaintained. For many residents, it can feel far-fetched to imagine an attractively designed townhouse or fourplex in their community.

We typically experience two types of objections related to neighborhood character. The first is associated with the size and scale and the second is associated with architectural design and quality.

Objection: Apartments and townhomes are too big and boxy to be compatible with this single-family neighborhood.

This objection is not without merit: many forms of higher density housing would in fact present a stark contrast in neighborhoods that are predominantly single-family houses. Residents may be visualizing the apartment buildings they know: three- to four-story, boxy buildings with a large footprint on the site.

The first step to addressing this objection is to recognize the limits of terms we often use to describe housing types. “Single-family” and “multi-family” or “detached” and “attached” are broad and abstract terms. The dividing lines between these categories have little to do with the physical character of the building; they simply define whether a dwelling unit shares a wall, ceiling, or floor with another dwelling unit.

Our zoning codes often reinforce the use of these categories. But must we be limited to these categories? In reality, there is a diverse palette of building types on the spectrum from lower intensity to higher intensity.

This was the insight behind Daniel Parolek’s coining of the term “missing middle” housing: the underdiscussed and underappreciated building types between single-family detached houses and mid-rise apartment buildings.3 The desire for a new term to interrupt the old categories has been made clear by how widely it has been embraced, including even in state statute.4

In working with your community on these concepts, it’s critical to not simply describe these building types but to convey the underlying reason why they are compatible with single-family houses. The central idea that connects these types is that these are “house-scale” buildings: their footprint and overall size is not significantly larger than a typical single-family house. By allowing these building types on the same size lots as single-family houses, the focus of the zoning code shifts from regulating density to regulating physical form and scale.

*Image 2: This graphic, produced by Opticos Design, effectively conveys a key message: higher density need not mean larger buildings.*

Educating your community on concepts like middle housing is a good first step. However, residents may also need to be convinced that your development code will deliver buildings that are compatible with single-family houses.

New code standards are often needed to effectively integrate middle housing. There are a variety of approaches depending on the scope of change that is supported. The most straightforward is to supplement existing dimensional standards (setbacks, height, lot coverage) with a maximum Floor Area Ratio (FAR).5 A slightly more targeted approach is to also regulate the maximum width or depth of buildings or establish a “bulk plane” that limits bulk around the edges of a site. A more complex approach, though more predictable and precise, is to define building types in your code with specific dimensional attributes.6

Objection: That type of housing will be incompatible with the architectural quality or style of this neighborhood.

In some communities or neighborhoods, objections to new housing go beyond the scale of buildings and center on architectural style, design, or quality. This is more common, but not limited to, neighborhoods with some form of historic resource protection or simply a collection of older, traditionally styled houses.

The underlying misconception here is that higher density housing types cannot be designed to be consistent with a particular architectural style or meet a minimum level of design quality. While the number of dwellings in a building influences its form, it does not dictate every architectural decision.

Image 3: It is important to show your residents that allowing new housing does not mean allowing any housing. Design standards can continue to encourage more high-quality, pedestrian-oriented design like the example on left, and discourage new housing like the example on right.

In fact, there are many examples of apartments, townhouses, and cottage courts that are beautiful expressions of traditional architectural styles. Some may even be found in your community. Consider organizing a walk around the community and search for multi-unit housing hiding in plain sight. Look for more than one front door, more than one mailbox, or more than one utility meter. Documenting these examples is a great way to build support for zoning changes.7

Ultimately, to effectively respond to this objection, planners should be ready to adopt new design standards or refine existing design standards in concert with allowing higher density housing.

Parking

In smaller American towns and cities, it is impossible to separate planning for housing with planning for parking. Most households are tethered to a vehicle (or two or three) that must be stored somewhere near where they live.

Allocating space to store those vehicles is always a physical and financial puzzle for a housing developer. Surface parking occupies space that could otherwise be used for housing, about 400 square foot per space if you include circulation area. If the code requires 2 spaces per unit, that’s 800 square feet of site area. If a three-story building were sited on that same plot of land, it could host up to six studio apartments.

Why not put the parking in a garage and build housing on top? This may solve the physical problem, but it creates a financial problem. While a surface parking space costs $2,500-$5,000 to build, a garage or “tuck under” space can cost $20,000-$30,000 per space.8 This cost can be absorbed if the market will bear it, but that certainly won’t foster more affordable housing options.

Regardless of how it is provided, parking influences the cost of housing. If parking requirements exceed what a developer would otherwise judge to be needed, then the requirement itself may be unnecessarily increasing the cost of housing. There is an abundance of academic research that has verified this fact.9

Image 4: We modeled the impact of reducing minimum parking requirements from 1.5 spaces per unit to 0.5 space per unit in Lander, Wyoming and found it could reduce minimum feasible rents by nearly 20%.

Yet, when planners or local advocates suggest reducing minimum parking requirements, they are nearly always met with opposition from some existing residents.

Objection: Every family that lives here owns two or three cars.

This objection is common in smaller towns. The number of cars owned per household is certainly higher in places that don’t have robust transit. Yet, residents are often surprised by the actual data on vehicle ownership in their community. Planners can pull this data from the American Community Survey for most cities.10 For example, we pulled this data for five cities in Wyoming, and found that about 40% of households in those cities owned just one car or did not own a car at all.

*Image 5: The number of households that own one car (or no car) in your community may be higher than you assume. Source: American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, 2013-2017*

Of course, many households in these cities own two or three cars, so the average number of cars per household is usually between 1.5 and 2.5. Yet should the minimum parking requirements be set based on the average number of vehicles owned per household? There are two reasons this is a faulty policy choice.

First, this logic assumes that the households in any particular development will own as many vehicles as the citywide average. What if the development is catering to the 40% of households that own one car or no cars? Setting a minimum of 1.5 or 2 spaces per unit precludes a developer from most efficiently meeting the needs of this segment of the population.

Second, this logic assumes that every vehicle associated with a development must be parked on site. As we discuss next, we suggest that planners unfetter themselves and their residents from this idea.

Objection: Developments must accommodate every parking space on-site.

Residents have good reason to assume this the purpose of minimum parking requirements is to ensure all parking associated with the development is provided on the site: it is often stated explicitly in the zoning code. Yet most zoning codes were originally written decades ago when the cost of housing was not a central issue. Now is the time for cities to reconsider this policy.

At the core of this assumption is the belief that—absent minimum requirements—developers will not provide sufficient parking on site. It is important to remember that developers have a strong incentive to provide parking: people generally prefer the convenience of on-site parking. Providing no or little on-site parking is risky, as developers may have trouble leasing up or selling units with no parking and may have to reduce their asking price.

A recent study confirms the strength of this incentive. The City of Buffalo, New York, eliminated parking requirements in 2017. There were 566 residential units approved between 2017 and 2021, and those developments provided a total of 760 parking spaces, 17% greater than the previous minimum requirements.11

Objection: Spillover on-street parking will ruin the neighborhood

Even if we do assume that developers will sometimes underprovide parking, we rarely examine whether this might be an acceptable tradeoff for the benefits of lower housing costs.

Admittedly, framing this decision as a tradeoff between convenient on-street parking and more affordable housing is inherently difficult. Most existing residents won’t directly benefit from the new housing, but they may be inconvenienced by more congested on-street parking.

Yet, good public policy should consider and balance the needs of the public as a whole, including potential future residents of a community. There are strong reasons to believe that the benefits of reducing parking requirements outweigh the costs in most situations.

On the costs side of the ledger, it is clear that the harms of spillover on-street parking are usually overstated. We should first recall that on-street parking adjacent to your house is not a right that is guaranteed to all residents. On-street parking is a public facility that is provided for convenience and livability. Perhaps we assume that a city’s goal for on-street parking is that all residents can access an on-street parking space within a block of their house. Would reducing minimum off-street parking requirements make this goal infeasible? There are several reasons to believe it would not:

Many developers will continue to provide on-site parking.
New housing development is usually distributed across multiple locations, lessening impacts on any one block.
Existing residents that use on-street parking but have access to an off-street space may use that space if on-street parking becomes less convenient.

On the benefits side of the ledger, the positive impact of reduced parking requirements is clear and persuasive. Significant cost savings can be passed on to housing consumers. Consumers gain the option of buying lower-cost housing without on-site parking and adjusting their travel behavior in response. Fewer spaces go unused, resulting in a more efficient use of land.

By framing the decision to set parking requirements as a tradeoff between multiple goals—and not as a linear, narrow calculation that assumes all parking must be accommodated on site—planners can set the table for a more informed and balanced policy. In many cases, this may result in lower or more flexible parking requirements.12

Objection: How else are we supposed to manage parking issues?

Discussions about reducing minimum parking requirements are often embedded in a discussion about zoning. While the zoning code is an important tool in managing the parking supply, it is not the only tool. Even if we assume that reducing parking requirements results in excessive spillover parking, then there are several other tools and strategies to mitigate these negative impacts.13

Any discussion of parking requirements should also include consideration of alternative tools to manage the supply of on-street parking. Many of these tools are more costly to implement than a zoning requirement, yet they more directly address the underlying problem and result in a more efficient use of land.

Conclusion

There are many other types of objections to zoning reforms intended to stimulate new housing. We choose to focus on the issues above because local planners find it difficult to navigate the intertwining issues of density, affordability, character, design, and parking.

This does not mean these issues are more common or more vexing than other objections. We also often hear from existing residents that they don’t want renters to live in their community, they believe crime will rise if new housing types are allowed, or property values will decline. We suggest planners prepare for these objections and seek out other resources for guidance.

Our main takeaway is simple: avoid the pitfall of assuming that technical zoning solutions are sufficient. While new technical approaches are essential, they are just one ingredient in a successful zoning reform process. Planning staff must also be able and willing to respond to objections with accurate information, educate their communities, and engage in difficult, messy conversations about issues that people feel passionately about.

This work may also cause you to reflect on your professional ethical obligations as they relate to zoning and housing. The AICP Code of Ethics states that we “owe our allegiance to a conscientiously attained concept of the public interest” and that we shall seek social justice by “recognizing a special responsibility to plan for the needs of the disadvantaged and to promote racial and economic integration.”14 These principles can serve as useful reminders of our obligation to represent interests and needs that may not always be visible or vocal.

About the Authors

Jamin Kimmell, AICP, with Cascadia Partners, is an urban planner with experience in a diverse range of projects and disciplines. With a wide variety of past experience, Jamin’s recent projects have focused on planning and code initiatives to shape a more equitable and affordable housing market. He holds a Master of Urban and Regional Planning from Portland State University and is a graduate of the University of Colorado at Boulder. In his spare time, he enjoys volunteering for a local non-profit housing organization and exploring the northwest with his family.

Lydia Ness is an urban planner for Cascadia Partners and has worked in public and non-profit sectors. Her background includes historic preservation focused on Main Street revitalization and rural redevelopment of historic buildings. She most recently has worked on housing policy research and analysis at the local, state, and federal level with the intent to inform elected officials and public sector staff on decision making. Lydia holds a Master’s in Urban and Regional Planning from Portland State University with a Certificate in Real Estate Development and a Bachelors in Historic Preservation. In her spare time, she enjoys tending to her ever-growing houseplant collection. She also loves camping and checking out small towns across the PNW.

Rachel Cotton, AICP is an urban planner for Cascadia Partners with a wide variety of experience spanning the public, private, and non-profit sectors. Her work has focused on housing, economic development, marketing and data analysis, parks and trails planning, visioning, participatory GIS, and policy choices. Rachel holds a Master of Urban and Regional Planning from Portland State University along with a Graduate Certificate in Real Estate Development. She is AICP certified by the American Planning Association and is the Co-Chair of the Coastal Equity and Inclusion Committee.

WORKS CITED

1. For a primer that is oriented to small towns, see this toolkit we compiled for the Wyoming Department of Commerce in partnership with Community Builders: https://www.wyopass.org/planning_resources/zoning_toolkit.php

2. For a fun and helpful video to illustrate this concept, see: https://www.sightline.org/2017/10/31/video-cruel-musical-chairs-why-is-rent-so-high/
3. Opticos Design. 2019. “Missing Middle Housing: Diverse Choices for Walkable Neighborhood Living.” Missing Middle Housing. 2019. https://missingmiddlehousing.com/

4. Oregon passed a state law in 2019 that requires most larger cities to allow “middle housing”: https://www.oregon.gov/lcd/UP/Pages/Housing-Choices.aspx

5. The City of Portland adopted this approach in allowing fourplexes on all residential lots: Andersen, Michael. 2020. “Portland Just Passed the Best Low-Density Zoning Reform in US History.” Sightline Institute. August 11, 2020. https://www.sightline.org/2020/08/11/on-wednesday-portland-will-pass-the-best-low-density-zoning-reform-in-us-history/

6. Planetizen has a useful primer on this approach: https://courses.planetizen.com/course/form-based-codes-building-types-1

7. This Flickr photo library, organized by the Sightline Institute, is a great resource for examples: https://www.flickr.com/photos/sightline_middle_housing/

8. WGI. 2019. “Parking Structure Cost Outlook for 2019.” WGI. May 23, 2019. https://wginc.com/parking-outlook/

9. Litman, Todd. 2021. “Parking Requirement Impacts on Housing Affordability.” https://www.vtpi.org/park-hou.pdf
10. This website from the ACS is a useful starting point: https://www.census.gov/acs/www/about/why-we-ask-each-question/vehicles/. For more detailed breakdowns, visit: https://data.census.gov/cedsci/ and search for Table ID: B08203

11. Hess, Daniel Baldwin, and Jeffrey Rehler. 2021. “Minus Minimums: Development Response to the Removal of Minimum Parking Requirements in Buffalo (NY).” Journal of the American Planning Association, March, 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1864225

12. For more resources on parking, see: “Rethinking Off-Street Parking Requirements.” APA KnowledgeBase. American Planning Association. https://www.planning.org/knowledgebase/parkingrequirements/

13. Litman, Todd. 2016. “Parking Management Strategies, Evaluation and Planning.” https://www.vtpi.org/park_man.pdf

14. American Institute of Certified Planners. 2019. “AICP Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct.” American Planning Association. 2019. https://www.planning.org/ethics/ethicscode/

Overcoming Objections to Zoning Reform: A Primer for Planners