Riverside council hears plan for hybrid zoning rewrite to shape corridor redevelopment

Todd Kinski, a consultant with Zoning Co, told the Riverside City Council on Jan. 21 that the city’s zoning code should be rewritten as a “hybrid” Unified Development Ordinance to better implement the recently completed comprehensive plan and guide redevelopment along the city’s commercial corridors.

Kinski said the work is a diagnosis-calibration-writing process and warned that “rewriting a zoning code is a messy business.” He proposed starting with a six-month calibration phase with staff to resolve standards and then moving into code drafting, with community meetings during the writing phase. He said the full process could take roughly a year before bringing a final…