You won’t find a much more diverse city than Arlington. It’s like a cluster of suburbs. Its north side is nothing like its south side. Its eastern side is nothing like its western side. It has two major interstates crossing through it.
Those factors are a good reason to start strengthening standards across a city of nearly 400,000 residents.
On March 10, the city is having a come-and-go open house for the public to provide feedback on proposed residential infill and redevelopment standards.
Sessions are scheduled from 9 to 11 a.m., from 3 to 5 p.m., and from 6 to 8 p.m. in the city council chamber at Arlington City Hall, 101 W. Abrams St.
A 10-person focus group was created in July after the city council’s request to review Arlington’s Unified Development Code (UDC) standards.
The citizen-led Unity Council recommended in its report to the city council that the city should establish different standards for infill development and to remove barriers to increasing attainable quality housing for all.
The focus group — which includes representatives from the real estate community, small and large residential developers, homebuilders, neighborhood leaders, the Unity Council, and the Downtown Master Plan Advisory Board — has spent the past 10 months working with city staff to develop proposed standards to the UDC.
This final report focuses on five areas of study: Economic Disparities, Education and Workforce Training, Housing, Health and Wellness, Policing and Criminal Justice.
“For this report to be taken seriously — and received by folks who feel they been overlooked and left out — it must include these honest but difficult perspectives,” Dr. Jason E. Shelton, Unity Council chair, said in the report.
“Our city is diverse, and so are opinions about it.”
According to the city’s website, the proposals include:
- Creating a simplified, administrative approval process to allow partial relief from existing standards for small, infill lots or irregularly shaped lots.
- Creating a new Mixed Residential (MR) District that would promote and facilitate the development of residential neighborhoods with diverse housing types and limited commercial uses that would provide residents with places to congregate and find essential services. Traditional multi-family would not be permitted in an MR residential district.
- Easing residential redevelopment in older areas of the City, by allowing sites larger than 3 acres or a whole block face to utilize MR standards by-right.
- Allowing duplexes by right within existing Single-Family Zoning Districts, with compatibility standards.
- Allowing secondary living units in all Single-Family Zoning Districts. The proposal would remove the City’s requirement that the person occupying the secondary living unit be related to someone from a primary residential home at the property. They shall not be permitted as short-term rentals where not allowed by the City’s Short-Term Rental Chapter.
The standards are scheduled to be presented to the city’s planning and zoning commission for review on April 6, followed by the city council on April 26.
