Model Downtown Zoning Ordinance

About the Program

Category: Planning (Best in Category)

Year: 2011

The long-standing adage, a picture I worth a thousand words, suggests that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image. Ottawa County truly took this message to heart in their development of the Model Downtown Zoning Ordinance – a document that enhances the ability of community leaders to manage new growth and development. Moreover, the innovative, graphics-based Ordinance provides users with vivid, full-color illustrations and detailed architectural renderings to clearly depict and what the community aims to have itself look like in the future. The Ordinance contains over 600 images that clearly convey the community’s zoning standards with respect to architecture, setbacks, and parking, as well as signage, landscaping, and lighting. The ordinance also incorporates standards that require developers to submit realistic digital renderings to visually articulate what their proposed project(s) will look like upon completion and how it will fit into the existing environment. The contents of the Ordinance are organized in a logical, step-by-step sequence to ensure that users apply the appropriate standards to their respective project(s). Moreover, the document was created in an innovative format that allows community staff to easily incorporate amendments and high-resolution graphics into the Ordinance, while still retaining the document’s professional standard. As the product of a multi-year review process that engaged dozens of community leaders to the point where they learned more about the intricacies of planning than they had ever known before, the Ordinance helped to simplify the decision-making process for local officials with respect to their reviewing and approving new development proposals for the community.