Form-based code

(See also the Form-based section of the Zoning in the United States article.)

A Form-Based Code (FBC) is a means of regulating land development to achieve a specific urban form. Form-Based Codes foster predictable built results and a high-quality public realm by using physical form (rather than separation of uses) as the organizing principle, with a lesser focus on land use, through municipal regulations. A FBC is a regulation, not a mere guideline, adopted into city, town, or county law and offers a powerful alternative to conventional zoning regulation.

Form-Based Codes are a new response to the modern challenges of urban sprawl, deterioration of historic neighborhoods, and neglect of pedestrian safety in new development. Tradition has declined as a guide to development patterns, and the widespread adoption by cities of single-use zoning regulations has discouraged compact, walkable urbanism. Form-Based Codes are a tool to address these deficiencies, and to provide local governments the regulatory means to achieve development objectives with greater certainty.

Form-Based Codes address the relationship between building facades and the public realm, the form and mass of buildings in relation to one another, and the scale and types of streets and blocks. The regulations and standards in Form-Based Codes, presented in both diagrams and words, are keyed to a regulating plan that designates the appropriate form and scale (and therefore, character) of development rather than only distinctions in land-use types. This is in contrast to conventional zoning's focus on the micromanagement and segregation of land uses, and the control of development intensity through abstract and uncoordinated parameters (e.g., floor area ratios, dwelling units per acre, setbacks, parking ratios) to the neglect of an integrated built form. Not to be confused with design guidelines or general statements of policy, form-based codes are regulatory, not advisory.

Form-Based Codes are drafted to achieve a community vision based on time-tested forms of urbanism. Ultimately, a Form-Based Code is a tool; the quality of development outcomes is dependent on the quality and objectives of the community plan that a code implements.

Form-Based Codes are part of a long history of shaping the built landscape. Such efforts go back to the urban designs of Hippodamus of Miletus, the planning of cities in ancient China, and Roman town planning. The Laws of the Indies, promulgated by the Spanish Crown starting in the 16th century, established some basic urban form requirements for colonial towns in the Americas. William Penn when planning Philadelphia in the 17th century did not shy from precise urban form requirements when he said, "Let every house be in a line, or upon a line, as much as may be."

...
Wikipedia