Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Infill Housing topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Consultants point to Holland, Mich., ordinance and separate height maps as models for Evanston infill
Summary
McKenna told Evanston staff that lessons from Holland, Michigan and other college towns — including allowing housing in formerly nonresidential zones, separate building-height maps, and form-based code — can increase missing-middle housing while preserving neighborhood character.
In responding to the first interview question, Chris Corey and his team cited work in Holland, Michigan as a concrete precedent for addressing infill, institutional adjacency and missing-middle housing. Corey said the Holland ordinance eliminated many nonresidential districts and allowed mixed-use and housing in areas formerly zoned for commercial or industrial uses, and that the firm had used a separate building-height map to tailor height outcomes without overhauling every district.
Corey described examples where form-based code preserved pedestrian transparency, hid parking and encouraged walkable streetscapes. He also said work in other college towns (Mount Pleasant, Oxford) showed options such as historic-district tools and zoning tweaks to respond to institutional pressures. "We were able to eliminate all nonresidential zoning districts..." Corey said to illustrate one technique the firm would consider for Evanston.
The presenters emphasized that these are policy choices to be reconciled with Evanston's existing adoption history and local goals; they did not propose immediate code language in the interview, but recommended technical review and scenario modeling before drafting enforceable ordinance text.
