Murfreesboro workshop advances updates to city design guidelines, adds flexible open-space and material standards

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — City officials, Planning Commission members and consultants met in a joint workshop to review proposed updates to the city's design guidelines, including new open-space rules, a required three-layer "enhanced landscape" option for certain sites, separate standards for townhomes and industrial buildings, tighter guidance on metal panels, and language that would prohibit flat fuel-station canopies and apply similar requirements to car washes.

Consultant Kevin Gunther of Reagan Smith (the firm now operating as Pape Dawson) told the joint session that "one thing I do want to note is that these are adopted standards," and said the team had spent months with a stakeholder committee of local developers, architects and engineers to produce the revisions. The consultants proposed a chart that would categorize each land use by zoning to show where formal open space is "required," "optional" or "exempt," and to offer an "enhanced landscape" alternative where formal open space is not required.

Why it matters: The changes would alter what developers must provide on some sites and give staff clearer standards to apply during plan review. Committee members said the rewrite aims to reduce the number of planner-to-planner inconsistencies that have arisen under the older document and to make the rules easier for applicants to navigate while preserving a clear design baseline for the city.

Key changes and details

- Open space and "enhanced landscape": The consultants described a new approach that will treat formal open space differently across land uses; where formal open space is optional or exempt, developers could use an "enhanced landscape" treatment. The presentation said the enhanced landscape would vary by building height and include an expanded planting strip (described in the presentation as roughly 3 to 11 feet) with three layers (groundcover, shrubs and trees) or equivalent design elements such as benches or bollards.

- Townhomes and industrial uses separated: The draft separates townhomes and industrial buildings into distinct design categories with tailored guidance on massing, facade treatments, materials and proportions, reflecting stakeholder feedback that those uses were previously ambiguous in the 2014/2017 document.

- Materials and metal-panel standards: Consultants said metal panels would be permitted in certain commercial and industrial building types but only when meeting quality criteria and coverage limits; they referenced construction-specification guidance spoken in the meeting as CSI Section "74213" for caliper and material quality and emphasized staff review for borderline cases.

- Roof and canopy guidance: The draft continues the longstanding direction to avoid flat, featureless canopies on fueling stations and adds car washes to that guidance. Consultants and some council members discussed flexibility for national chains; Kevin Gunther said changes are fair "as long as that change is clear, and communicated at the front end, and done with... respect for how they might achieve our objective."

- Appeals and administration: Staff reviewed the enabling language in the Tennessee Code Annotated and a 2014 ordinance that delegated design-review authority to the Planning Commission; staff confirmed that an applicant who feels aggrieved by how the commission administers the guidelines may appeal to the city council. City staff and council members described using joint conceptual workshops as an outlet for applicants and staff to resolve interpretations before formal applications.

Quotes and context

"One thing I do want to note is that these are adopted standards," Kevin Gunther said, stressing the difference between voluntary suggestions and enforceable rules. He also told the group, "So, there is actually going to be a chart in the document" to clarify when formal open space is required, optional or exempt.

Stakeholders said the process of re-examining the document after more than a decade is meant to capture changes in materials and building types and to reduce recurring interpretation problems. A city representative noted that the Planning Commission will retain delegated authority for day-to-day administration so that staff can make routine decisions while the council remains the ultimate arbiter for appeals.

What's next

No votes were taken at the workshop. Staff said the revisions would be returned to the Planning Commission for formal consideration and then brought to the City Council for acknowledgment. The stakeholder group will continue to meet to refine specific sections, and staff said they will track recurring interpretation issues and propose future edits on a shorter review cycle than the 11 years since the last major update.

The Planning Commission portion and the City Council portion were adjourned at the close of the meeting; no adoption occurred during the workshop.