Question

What is the role of a community zoning plan? Why allow zoning in the first place?

Answer 1

Zoning is the process of dividing land in a municipality into zones (e.g. residential, industrial) in which certain land uses are permitted or prohibited.In addition, the sizes, bulk, and placement of buildings may be regulated. The type of zone determines whether planning permission for a given development is granted. Zoning may specify a variety of outright and conditional uses of land. It may also indicate the size and dimensions of land area as well as the form and scale of buildings. These guidelines are set in order to guide urban growth and development.

Zoning is a tool used to advance and protect the
community’s public health, safety and general welfare.
Communities use zoning to protect the value of
property, prevent the establishment of nuisances,
ensure compatibility between adjacent uses of land,
protect and properly use natural resources, and help to
implement the land use objectives of a community’s
comprehensive plan.
Zoning districts are established to promote
compatible patterns of land use within a defined area.
Zoning regulations establish site development and
performance standards appropriate to the purposes and
the uses allowed in each district. Distinct zoning dis-
tricts exist for residential, office, retail and industrial
uses. Furthermore, specific use restrictions, site
development regulations or performance standards may
apply to zoning districts may be combined with special
overlay or combining districts.
As part of the zoning process, planners identify
appropriate land uses for an area based on such
factors as the intensity, density, height of a proposed
project, surrounding land uses, traffic impacts and
access to a site, environmental concerns and overall
compatibility.
A zoning change may be required to change a land
use or alter a building or site within the zoning area.

Early zoning practices were subtle and often debated. Some claim the practices started in the 1920s while others suggest the birth of zoning occurred in New York in 1916.Both of these examples for the start of zoning, however, were urban cases. Zoning becomes an increasing legal force as it continues to expand in its geographical range through its introduction in other urban centres and use in larger political and geographical boundaries. Regional zoning was the next step in increased geographical size of areas under zoning laws. A major difference between urban zoning and regional zoning was that "regional areas consequently seldom bear direct relationship to arbitrary political boundaries"This form of zoning also included rural areas which was counter-intuitive to the theory that zoning was a result of population density.Finally, zoning also expanded again but back to a political boundary again with state zoning.