SmartCode
Background
In the discussion of Smart Growth and alternatives to sprawl one of the key aspects most often overlooked is that developers are often working within a system of community development codes and standards that were designed, whether intentionally or not, to promote subdivisions and strip malls. For those who wish to change these patterns for their communities to allow for land conservation and to promote traditional patterns of hamlet, village, town and city, new codes are necessary designed for this purpose. The most comprehesive example of a code designed from the ground up for this purpose is the SmartCode as described below.
Technical Description
The SmartCode is a model design and development code released by Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company (DPZ) in 2003. It is considered both a form-based code and a transect-based code. It is freeware, a template (model code) designed for customization for local character and needs.
Though version 9.0 is only 50 pages, the SmartCode may replace conventional zoning, subdivision, and design regulations, making walkable mixed-use development legal by right.
The SmartCode is a unified code in that is has coordinated Articles for all scales of planning: regional, community, and block/building. The range of scales distinguishes it from other form-based codes. The customizations (calibrations) can differ significantly depending upon the community.
Though "zoning" is usually thought of by planners as the separation of uses into Residential, Commercial, and Industrial, the kinds of zones that the SmartCode allocates - Transect Zones or T-zones - are complex habitats similar to ecozones. The rural-urban transect is the conceptual and analytical framework for the standards of the ordinance. Transect-based zoning is intended to keep settlements compact and rural lands open, thus reforming the destructive sprawl-producing patterns of separated-use zoning.
The first city to adopt a SmartCode as a mandatory overlay for its downtown was Petaluma, CA in June 2003. The City of Miami is currently going through the adoption process for an exclusive citywide SmartCode calibrated by Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co. Cities that have adopted SmartCodes as a parallel option to their conventional zoning include Gulfport, MS, Pass Christian, MS, and Montgomery, AL. In addition, scores of private traditional neighborhood developments (TND) have been permitted under transect-based codes that are essentially the same as Article 5 of the SmartCode.