Form-Based Codes

In urbanism and planning, the term transect provides a conceptual framework for understanding how the scale of built environments can vary from place to place.

August 18, 2022 - James Brasuell

Auburn, Maine offers the latest an example of a small city deciding to increase its capacity for future development in response to housing pressure, even in the face of intense public opposition.

March 31, 2022 - Sun Journal

The Iowa City Planning Commission approved a rezoning amendment that will allow new missing middle density and implement a form-based code for the city's South District. The city could expand the concepts as it expands the city in the future.

October 6, 2021 - Iowa City Press Citizen

The Congress for the New Urbanism has announced the hiring of Rick Cole as the its new executive director, filling a role left vacant by the departure of Lynn Richards earlier this year.

May 5, 2021 - CNU Public Square

Insider knowledge on one of the most controversial components of a groundbreaking plan.

January 5, 2021 - Globe St.

New Urbanism is one of the most influential planning and urban design reform movements of recent decades.

November 30, 2020 - James Brasuell

The new form-based code for the Kentucky city of Covington went into effect on October 15. Officials are promoting the simplicity of the new code to the public.

October 19, 2020 - WCPO

Covington, Kentucky, located just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, has implemented a fundamental shift in the city's planning philosophy by adopting a new form-based Neighborhood Development Code.

September 29, 2020 - The River City News

Form-based codes are a variety of development regulation that departs significantly from the land use control approach of most zoning codes in the United States.

July 16, 2020 - James Brasuell

Local governments use zoning codes to define what can and cannot be built. While comprehensive plans and other kinds of plans lay out a vision for the future, zoning codes offer the legal tools to implement that vision.

July 15, 2020 - James Brasuell

Richmond, Virginia is hoping to make some big changes in time for its tricentennial in 2037, including a new cap park and a new form-based code.

July 7, 2020 - Richmond BizSense

The potential of form-based codes to re-legalize the historic fabric of Cleveland is explained for the nightly news audience.

February 20, 2020 - News 5 Cleveland

The first deliverable in the process of updating the city of Detroit's zoning ordinance is publically available.

September 19, 2019 - Curbed Detroit

The new form-based zoning code under consideration in the affluent Philadelphia suburb of Lower Merion "has something to teach Philadelphia and other big cities about how to organize density smartly," according to Inga Saffron.

September 9, 2019 - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Local governments didn't want the Texas State Legislature to approved HB 2439, but now the bill is officially law. Some communities worry that they can no longer control the aesthetics of new development.

June 20, 2019 - NBC DFW

Last week's urbanism social media landscape was dominated by discussion of an article that digs into the historical and technical origins of the contemporary mid-rise apartment building type.

February 19, 2019 - Bloomberg BusinessWeek

The city of Covington is conducting public hearings to gather feedback on at the outset of an 18-month process of rewriting its zoning code.

February 18, 2019 - City of Covington

The story of the Grand Rapids zoning code update of a decade ago offers perspective on the possibilities of code reform.

January 1, 2019 - Next City

The city of Missoula professes a strategy of "focusing inward" when it comes to growth and development. A new 'Design Excellence Overlay' will help achieve more goals toward that strategy in the city's downtown.

October 18, 2018 - Missoula Current

A call for civility amid the great zoning debate in Austin, Texas.

June 11, 2018 - KUT