COMPREHENSIVE PLANS ACROSS THE U.S.

Map of U.S. States Which Require Every Municipality (towns and cities) To File a Comprehensive Plan.



Exceptions
Hawaii: Only requires the four major counties to have comprehensive plans. Those counties may or may not require the towns in their jurisdiction to have one.
Minnesota: Only required in 7 metro counties
*States that require a Comprehensive Plan if the municipality wants zoning is included under the not required category.

The Search--Two students set out to discover which states required their towns and cities to maintain comprehensive plans. The challenge to that task is related by each below:
Kristin Hadjstylianos--- I used the American Planning Association websites for each state to find numbers for the chapter’s presidents and state planners. . . At least one source sent me to the source legislation--the state planner from Maine was a professor at a college who thought having me search through Maine’s state statutes would be a better learning experience . . . I was surprised at how many people I called were unsure of their answer; several times I was directed to another person to double check. . . While I the APA’s (American Planning Association) websites for each state were generally helpful, some of them hadn’t been updated in years.
. . . My conversation with a regional planner from Minnesota was probably the most interesting. Only their 7 metro counties (the bigger cities) have requirements while their smaller towns have no requirements and few of them have plans. I found that different areas in the country refer to their plans with various names including General Plans, Master Plans, but Comprehensive Plan was the most widely used. I think this map shows how planning in general is not a united concept throughout the nation.

Katherine Galezowski--- The project began with a question in class no one knew the answer to: "Which U.S. states require a Comprehensive Plan?”
. . . I gathered information by individually contacting twenty five states while my project team member (Kristin) gathered the other half and created a map from the data. . . I began my search by looking for a single source online--quickly realizing this information has not been assembled in one place. Next, I attempted to call and e-mail planning departments of randomly selected towns of my assigned states. I asked them if the state required their city or town to have a Comprehensive Plan. I noticed that if I worded this question using the word legally in it, some employees reacted as if they were intimidated or thought they were going to get into trouble for not having one.
. . . To my surprise, many city planners and their secretaries or staff did not have this information at their finger tips. Because of this, I feel the data collected needs further verification.
. . . I found it easiest to call members of the American Planning Association (APA) because someone with planning experience was more than often available.
. . . Among other things, I learned that some states do not require a Comprehensive Plan because the city or town follows the County’s plan. Other states only require a plan if the city wants to obtain funding or a grant.

POCD and Zoning: How are they Related?

by John Boren


In order to have a broad understanding of how comprehensive planning is performed and implemented in Connecticut, the relationship between the Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD) and zoning must be examined. In the state of Connecticut, each town is required to create a comprehensive plan every ten years. The town is then to adopt zoning regulations that enable land uses that conform to the vision laid forth in the comprehensive plan. To be effective, the POCD must be supported by good zoning regulations, and these regulations are not appropriate if they do not directly relate to the POCD.

Per General Statute 8-23, each of Connecticut’s 169 towns is required to create a Plan of Conservation and Development. This plan is to be comprehensive in that it lays out guidelines for development and growth management, as well as to preserve and protect existing natural or cultural resources. The plan charts a course for how the town intends to grow for the following decade however it must not be so restrictive as to allow for changing conditions. The comprehensive plan is generated and approved by the local planning committee with input from the public and in coordination with related regional and state agencies.

Once the POCD has been enacted, zoning rules must be changed or modified as necessary to promote the desired outcomes of the plan. Any goals laid out by the POCD should be supported by zoning that enables them to be met. For instance, a community that desires more mixed use development must zone land with this designation so that is possible for this activity to occur. The comprehensive plan and zoning regulations go hand in hand and must be coordinated for a community to best realize its goals.

Learning More About Planning in New Britain

Excerpts of student essays on what was learned about our city--Based on a visit with the head of the New Britain Department of Municipal Development, Mr. Kenneth Malinowski---
On March 31, our class had the opportunity to do a brief walking tour of downtown New Britain with Kenneth Malinowski, the Director of the Department of Municipal Development. During this walk, Mr. Malinowski highlighted efforts to revitalize the downtown through increased historic preservation, bringing in new downtown residents, as well as a commitment to creating more attractive gateways into the city.
(John Boren)

Just like in many cities across the United States, New Britain has been influenced by suburbanization and sprawl. This has taken [much] of the downtown life away.
(Philip Hinks)

Urban renewal [also played a role in] destroying downtown according to Mr. Malinowski. He noted that New Britain’s government didn’t help matters by destroying most of downtown housing as people moved outwards . . . It is similar to the chicken vs. egg dilemma. How do you get businesses to move to a place where there are no people on the streets and how do you get people on the streets in a place where there is nothing to do, and nowhere to live? (Jackie Rubin)

This POCD has explicitly outlined new urbanism ideals which will hopefully preserve historic buildings downtown yet also incorporate them in future design of the urban fabric. (Melissa Pierce)

New Britain's Planning Department directly caters to developers with the hope that it will help facilitate and encourage development. [Ken Malinowski] informed us that if a builder comes in with inquiries on a particular parcel or land or with questions regarding the renovation of an existing building downtown, [his office] will do everything in their power to devote their time to that project. (Michael D’Amato)

INTERVIEW WITH A PLANNER

A DISCUSSION WITH LINDA FARMER, AICP, Tolland Town Planner
by Melissa Pierce
Question: In most towns and at the state level, the POCD is mostly focused on development, rather than conservation/preservation. Do you believe that your town is similar?
Answer: Planimetrics designed Tolland’s most recent POCD which was adopted in November 2009. In Tolland’s case, the focus isn’t on development but conservation. One of the three main points of the POCD are environmental sustainability, economic responsibility, and contextual integrity. Tolland has drafted a separate Conservation Plan that was attached to previous POCD’s but is now a free standing document.
. . . There are maps that outline the “visual resources” in town such as scenic views and historic buildings. . . . .As the plan is new not all of these initiatives have been implemented but there are committees and societies (such as the Historic District Commission which regulates the town green and a separate Historic Society) have made these goals a priority.

Question: How do the state POCD and the General Statutes affect planning in Tolland and at the local level in general? What are the affects on regional planning? Do you feel that state regulations are overarching and sometimes overshadow town initiatives?
Answer: There are actually few planners at the state level despite how much unanticipated authority the state has. “The state has imposed a ‘one size fits all’ mentality on communities when life is not so black and white.” . . . . State regulations don’t often incorporate regional planning . . . resulting in little to no regional government or planning authority. This is unfortunate as there is little connectivity between towns and regions of Connecticut. . . . There are more options for planners in other states that have the mentality of working together and seeing a larger picture.
Question: What advice can you give to young planners?
Answer: Do research on better ways to do things because today planning is changing constantly. This was not always the case but we have learned from the ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s how to not mess things up anymore. We know how to make our spaces better. We know where to put higher densities but also know that this doesn’t work in every place. It’s important to look at examples outside of the United State of America. Places in Asia and Europe and others are way ahead of planners in the US. In Germany for example, there were PUD’s in the early 1990s that worked and worked well. Stay connected and educated and look to other planners and other organizations to continue learning. Regional planning groups like CRCOG are great resources as they gather information and send it to planner through various forums.

Smart Growth and Technology

by Pete Burke

Smart Growth is the use of urban policy and design in cities, towns, subdivisions and existing suburbs to promote more sustainable communities. There is no consensus on an exact definition for smart growth, rather most organizations measure smart growth through principles. One of the leading websites on smart growth, which receives funding from organizations like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is Smartgrowth.org. The ten principles of smart growth, as designated by www.smartgrowth.org are:

• Create Range of Housing Opportunities and Choices
• Create Walkable Neighborhoods
• Encourage Community and Stakeholder Collaboration
• Foster Distinctive, Attractive Communities with a Strong Sense of Place
• Make Development Decisions Predictable, Fair and Cost Effective
• Mix Land Uses
• Preserve Open Space, Farmland, Natural Beauty and Critical Environmental Areas
• Provide a Variety of Transportation Choices
• Strengthen and Direct Development Towards Existing Communities
• Take Advantage of Compact Building Design

Technology for a Sustainable Future

While the concept of smart growth has been around since the 1990's, new technology in the 21st Century will be vital to the development of the field. Some of these technologies are the different types of spatial software now available. Two of these softwares being developed are Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and 3-D rendering.

The first of these, the GIS software, is mainly made by ESRI. ESRI's software, like ARCMap, are seen as "planning support systems" and can be used to present alternative build-out scenarios. An example of this is presented on ESRI's website about Bowen Island in British Columbia. The planners in this small rural community used an extension for ARCMap called CommunityViz, which can create multiple scenarios using different zoning parameters. For example, in Bowen Island they created layers representing the current zoning pattern and all environmental constraints on development like wetlands, slopes over 25 degrees, farming soil and forested lands. When the current zoning pattern is activated, viewers can see how much land is devoted to conservation, housing, commercial and industrial. Next, the constraint layers can be activated and automatically the number of housing units and land available for commercial or conservation adjusts. So if all layers of constraints are turned on, obviously there will be more conserved land and less for development. But an added advantage of extensions like CommunityViz on software like ARCMap is the amount of detail a GIS analyst can put into the map. A specific type of animal species can be tied to certain parcels of land, so if a town or city wants to preserve a particular type of species they select that species and the parcels of land that need to be preserved in order to save the species will be highlighted in CommunityViz. Another type of example for CommunityViz can be seen in this video.

The second type of software defining the future capability of smart growth is 3-D rendering software. 3-D software will help planners visually see how smart growth codes impact the built and natural environment. This software is the same software being used in many new video games, and also search engines like Google's SketchUp. 3-D software helps a viewer better understand visually how a new development will look, while GIS software is more technical and is usually just used by the planning staff internally. While 3-D software does not have the technical aspects of how the redevelopment will be in terms of exact size of buildings, or even the exact look of the buildings it does do a good job of helping the viewer understand what the architects and planners are visualizing. A video example is available here, which shows the 3-D rendering of a harbor by the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Singapore.