Form-based zoning code key to revitalization

A key ingredient to the revitalization of the Sprague-Appleway corridor is the proposed form-based zoning code, consultant Michael Freedman told a special joint study session of the Spokane Valley City Council and Planning Commission on Tuesday.

“This is the most important thing I can leave you with this evening,” Freedman said.

An integral part of the regulations, the form-based code, would replace the existing conventional land-use zoning if Freedman’s plan is adopted.

“The system of zoning is different from what you’re used to,” Freedman said. “The current zoning can’t make your vision possible.”

Freedman’s San Francisco based Urban Design and Planning Firm – Freedman, Tung and Bottomley – developed the plan for the city with the intent of revitalizing the corridor and build a city center.

The revitalization manual is broken down into three books. Book 1 describes the community’s intent. Book 2 outlines the development regulations and Book 3 is city action to bring about the revitalization.

Tuesday, Freedman presented the development regulations for the corridor along with a thorough overview of the plan’s first and second book.

Freedman believes land-use zoning’s lack of design standards tends to deter risk adverse investors.

“Conventional zoning is very restrictive on use and very specific on density, but not on building type and character,” Freedman said. “This becomes hard for investors or anyone else to envision and predict physical outcomes on what’s going to happen next to their properties.

“And I believe we will see over the next decade as a country moving entirely off the conventional zoning. Right now, we have regulations that don’t jive with what the market wants to do. This almost 100-year-old code is well overdue for a major overhaul.”

Under form-based zoning, each of the proposed six district zones along the corridor – mixed use, residential boulevard, neighborhood centers, city center and gateway commercial avenue and centers – are subject to different zoning criteria in each district.

The form-based zoning has stricter guidelines on building design, regulating landscape treatments, signage and building physical characteristics. According to Freedman’s plan, regulating the building design creates a cohesive district and provides investment security.

“This is a state-of-the-art format,” Freedman added regarding form-based zoning. “It streamlines the development application, review and approval process.”

Freedman believes one drawback to adopting the proposed form-based code is the unfamiliar format. City staff hopes to conduct public education sessions to help with the transition.

“I think we are heading down that path,” Mayor Diana Wilhite said after the study session on adopting the form-based code. “We want to make sure the community comes and weighs in on it. ”

Freedman also presented changes to his original city center site plan. Last month, Freedman outlined a conceptual site plan for the proposed city center located west of University at the old U-City Mall site between Appleway and Sprague. The plan includes a proposed City Hall, a new approximately 50,000-square-foot Valley Library, as well as guidelines for development on the 30-acre site.

Incorporating feedback regarding limited library parking from last month’s meeting, the new plan displays 133 spots in and around the library. That is an additional 59 parking spaces from the previous plan.

Gaining the extra space came by moving the proposed City Hall building west of Dartmouth Road and moving Dartmouth 150 feet east. Originally, Freedman proposed the City Hall east of Dartmouth.

Study session discussion included the ability of the plan to fit within the parameters of Washington’s Growth Management Act, the exemption of any discussion on billboards in the current draft, and the plan’s approach to existing structures in the corridor area.