Zoning in Minneapolis

Parks, Minneapolis Public Schools, Density, Zoning, etc.
RailBaronYarr
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Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby RailBaronYarr » July 17th, 2013, 9:12 am

Not sure if this is the right place but it's definitely a Minneapolis-related thing:

http://www.minneapolismn.gov/www/groups ... 111133.pdf
As proposed, the amendment would eliminate “minimum lot area per dwelling unit” standards in most
districts. There is a growing consensus among planning commissioners that these standards may no
longer be an important tool for regulating development and that, in some instances, the limitations may
conflict with adopted policy objectives. As the City continues to place additional emphasis on quality
urban design and ensuring that new development makes a positive contribution to its urban context, the
specific number of dwelling units incorporated in new buildings has become less important.

..

If adopted, the zoning ordinance will still have a number of standards that place practical limits on the amount of density that could be constructed on an individual property. Those standards include:
• Minimum off-street parking requirements
• Maximum permitted height
• Maximum floor area ratio
• Minimum size of individual dwelling units (350 sq. ft. for efficiency units; 500 sq. ft. for all other units)
• Required yards/setbacks (primarily in R and OR Districts)
• Maximum building coverage (R and OR Districts only)
Nice start, but as noted plenty of other regulations that in practice limit density.

talindsay
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby talindsay » July 17th, 2013, 9:47 am

This is a *great* start. It would be even better to kill (or at least substantially limit) off-street parking minimums, but the rest of the other regulations continue to make sense as long as they're set correctly for the given zoning type.

On a tangential but related note, does anyone here know if R1A has been officially modified to allow secondary dwelling units over detached garages (so-called "mother-in-law apartments")? I know the city has approved variances for them for quite a few years now.

RailBaronYarr
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby RailBaronYarr » July 17th, 2013, 10:01 am

I disagree on most.. Size of individual dwelling unit crowds out an entry-level price point for dwelling units. Why is there a problem with long-term living in a 10x10 room if one was comfortable sharing a bathroom and kitchen with others? Why require front-yard setbacks at ground-level? As you increase in height I understand the desire (right?) for light, so do it by form-based code requiring setbacks above a given height (same goes for maximum height requirement). Building coverage again seems odd. Is it for stormwater filtration reasons? If so, why limit coverage instead of the effect (ex, runoff per lot area per inch of rainfall).

I guess the point is not to let development do whatever it wants wherever it wants - clearly the things I outline are in themselves regulations. But they force people to pay the market rate for the housing/neighborhood style they want to live in as the city grows and increases in value.

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby FISHMANPET » July 17th, 2013, 10:03 am

I'm sure the code still requires a full bathroom and some semblance, which makes rooming houses illegal, doesn't it? I'm sure plenty of people would be just fine with their own room and sharing a bathroom and large kitchen.

RailBaronYarr
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby RailBaronYarr » July 17th, 2013, 10:40 am

I think there is an allowance for rooming houses in certain types of development, but by and large not really. This article (from 1997!) has some key insights:

http://www.startribune.com/housing/rent/11363651.html

My favorite: "One major factor in the decline of rooming and boarding houses, experts said, is that these days people have more "stuff" and want more storage space and garages. And for many people, a house is an integral part of their identity, a symbol of achievement and worth. ... Rooming houses have neither lots of space nor cachet, and some have an image problem to overcome because there's a perception that they may attract people who live on the fringe of society and might not conform to the expectations of neighbors or others."

I think it's a cause and effect on the "stuff" argument - the more space you have the more you'll fill it. Secondly, this highlights the core understanding of why we broad-based limit certain housing types. We don't want those unsavory types of people living near us... People should desire to have the cachet of a house and all the status of achievement and wealth it represents, damnit!!

talindsay
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby talindsay » July 17th, 2013, 10:46 am

I disagree on most.. Size of individual dwelling unit crowds out an entry-level price point for dwelling units. Why is there a problem with long-term living in a 10x10 room if one was comfortable sharing a bathroom and kitchen with others? Why require front-yard setbacks at ground-level? As you increase in height I understand the desire (right?) for light, so do it by form-based code requiring setbacks above a given height (same goes for maximum height requirement). Building coverage again seems odd. Is it for stormwater filtration reasons? If so, why limit coverage instead of the effect (ex, runoff per lot area per inch of rainfall).

I guess the point is not to let development do whatever it wants wherever it wants - clearly the things I outline are in themselves regulations. But they force people to pay the market rate for the housing/neighborhood style they want to live in as the city grows and increases in value.
Note that setbacks and coverage only apply to residential-zoned buildings, which primarily means single-family detached and semi-detached housing, e.g., lower-density South Minneapolis. Building coverage is a pretty important consideration in this type of urban form; the places where it wasn't followed are immediately obvious. But remember, neither of these rules apply to the densely-built urban forms that people here are thinking about.

Size of individual dwelling unit is one that we could all debate I'm sure, but I for one don't see any benefit in a city with Minneapolis' density in allowing the issues that come with super-efficiency apartments. A 350-sq-ft efficiency apartment is plenty small in a city with cost of living such as we have.

Height and FAR requirements vary with the specific zone, as they should. Both can be changed with a variance when appropriate.

In general, keep in mind that all code can be changed with variances if there's a good reason: my house has setback variances on two of its four sides due to work we did; while the side yard was an automatic variance, the front-yard setback variance required a good argument and we convinced them that our case was appropriate.

mattaudio
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby mattaudio » July 17th, 2013, 11:03 am

The point is, what's the purpose in actively regulating it? Why not just regulate the form of structures and their relationship with the street and the neighborhood, and also regulate negative environmental/neighborhood impacts? I doubt the market would really be interested in building 150sf efficiencies in South Mpls that conform to a particular form.

It's like our food truck regulations (as an example, among many)... we regulate where they can be rather than what we expect as far as their impact. Do we think people are going to set up food trucks on Your Street, South Minneapolis in front of SFHs? Nope. So why limit where they can be in this way? Ward 9 (Phillips/Corcoran/Longfellow) is exempted and the world still turns.

Point is, we could get better positives and no more negatives for our city if we regulated in a smarter way.

RailBaronYarr
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby RailBaronYarr » July 17th, 2013, 11:10 am

I'm glad that since our cost of living is low enough that there isn't a place for such housing sizes (though the fact that there are homeless people and others working minimum wage who might choose this as an alternative to sharing an apartment, living with their parents, etc). Wouldn't, then, a person looking to maximize their profit (and minimize risk) recognize that such a demand doesn't exist and not build it until such a time that there was demand? Does anyone think the fact that so few of these type of housing structures, along with the "no more than 5 (6?) unrelated residents per SF structure" is a problem near collegiate campuses? Without many of these regulations, do you think there would be a much lower aggregate housing price for students, recent grads, etc? Why pick an arbitrary number (350, 300, 250 sqft, doesn't matter) to draw the line?

Why is building coverage an important consideration for lower-density locations and not others? Why is it obvious where it wasn't followed? Further, I assume this implies it was a bad thing, so by who's definition?

The point of saying things can be changed "when appropriate" or with "good argument" sets the stage for the laborious, expensive, and very limiting processes we have in place.

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minimum Lot Area per Dwelling Unit

Postby FISHMANPET » July 28th, 2013, 7:10 pm

Here's an article in the Star Tribune about this:
http://www.startribune.com/local/minnea ... 57301.html

One interesting thing of note, Kelly Doran says he would have liked to put smaller units in the Knoll, which I think would have been very appropriate in a college housing setting, but he wasn't able to. Also Gary Schiff is leading this effort, which makes me sad that he's dropped out of the race, it sounds like he's got a really good head about urban planning issues.

blobs
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby blobs » August 19th, 2013, 1:34 pm

What are the rules as far as building granny flats currently?

talindsay
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby talindsay » August 19th, 2013, 1:46 pm

Somebody can correct me if the rules have changed, but when I looked into it back in 2005 they weren't currently allowed by code in R1 or R1A zoning; BUT, the city had been granting variances for them intermittently for years. At that time the council had voiced support for widespread approval of variances on a trial basis as a way of increasing availability of more-affordable apartments since the city has such incredibly low vacancy in less-expensive apartments.

So, unless things have changed recently, you need a variance to get an occupancy permit on a granny flat in R1 or R1A zoning; but the city *does* grant them, and at least the last time I checked, they were more likely to approve than reject such a variance request.

MNdible
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby MNdible » August 19th, 2013, 1:55 pm

Wasn't there an overlay in Ventura Village that specifically allowed them?

seanrichardryan
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby seanrichardryan » August 19th, 2013, 11:57 pm

Yes, in a neighborhood that has little development pressure.
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RailBaronYarr
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby RailBaronYarr » August 20th, 2013, 8:15 am

Beyond basement apartments, isn't it impractical to have a unit above a garage, for example? Unless you build living space in the ground level of a one-story structure (like finish the space inside a garage), building above it is difficult. Height limitations, footprint maximums, and setbacks all make it kinda tough to create a second-story space more than 450 sqft...

talindsay
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby talindsay » August 20th, 2013, 8:38 am

With rents where they are, and given the costs of construction, anybody who needs to rebuild their garage anyway could easily be ahead by rebuilding it as a granny-flat structure. Minneapolis' maximum footprint for a garage is 686 square feet, if memory serves, and the maximum structure height increases to 16' at the midpoint of the roof *IF* the style of the garage matches the style of the house. For a house such as mine with a 9/12 roof that means a 28x24 structure with the roofline running the long way could have the peak of the roof at just over 20', and with gabled roof construction could easily yield a 500 square foot apartment - 28x18 feet, assuming an 8' ceiling height in the garage and a foot of floor thickness, gives you roughly 4.5 feet of wall height at the edge of the 18' wide floor section, meaning not much gabling is needed to extend standing-height ceiling over the full space.

Figure a 28x24 regular garage costs roughly $15k to build, and a granny flat costs $50k to build - conservative prices, to be sure, but doable. That means the difference in cost - $35k - could be covered by rent in well under ten years even figuring in the other costs associated. After that it's profit for the homeowner.

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mister.shoes
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby mister.shoes » August 20th, 2013, 9:26 am

My wife and I just built (well, we hired her contractor dad to build) a new garage last summer. We used those exact provisions in the code to do a 24x24 with a 10/12 pitch to match the house and an attic truss for the half story above. We even put in a permanent stairwell along the back wall for ease of access. The half walls are about 4.5 feet tall, as you noted. Our room is roughly 12' wide and about 23' long, give or take a little for the aforementioned stairwell. That's just under 300ft^2 of space, but it's incredibly useful for us. The garage currently isn't finished, but a couple thousand more dollars it could be.

Our cost came out in the upper half of your $15k–$50k range. That wasn't unexpected, as the one big requirement that you didn't mention was that the exterior finishes of the garage (siding, windows, roof, etc) must match the house to build that big. We re-sided our house at the same time, so we could have reduced our costs with shitty vinyl siding and plain gable ends and such, but opted to go with SmartSide lap and shakes, crown moulding, and some other period-appropriate touches.

All that said, you're exactly right :) I'm a real-world example that fits your theoretical scenario almost to a T.
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woofner
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby woofner » August 20th, 2013, 10:12 am

Another problem might be that the minimum unit size is 350 sq ft, so if it's tough to get more than 300 sq ft above a garage, there would need to be an exception for that as well. Not that the minimum unit size shouldn't be reduced, but one step at a time is how it goes unfortunately.

If I remember right some of this hoo-hah is why the Ventura Village overlay seemed destined to fail; there were some really spazzy stipulations about where the entrance had to be and stuff like that.
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David Greene
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby David Greene » August 20th, 2013, 10:23 am

My wife and I just built (well, we hired her contractor dad to build) a new garage last summer. We used those exact provisions in the code to do a 24x24 with a 10/12 pitch to match the house and an attic truss for the half story above. We even put in a permanent stairwell along the back wall for ease of access. The half walls are about 4.5 feet tall, as you noted. Our room is roughly 12' wide and about 23' long, give or take a little for the aforementioned stairwell. That's just under 300ft^2 of space, but it's incredibly useful for us. The garage currently isn't finished, but a couple thousand more dollars it could be.
We are thinking about doing the same and would love to learn more about your experience.

Did you add utilities to the room? If so, which? It's just a single room, so it would be a studio apartment?

What do you use it for currently?

RailBaronYarr
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby RailBaronYarr » August 20th, 2013, 11:55 am

Funny that you're allowed to build a shitty, ugly garage with whatever siding, shingles, finishes you want but if you want to build juts a little bit higher you have to match to the main structure. :/ Obviously, it can be done, but the minimum unit size, other limitations, etc all make it a tad more difficult. Isn't it 686 ft^2 or 10% of lot area, whichever is greater (as long as total lot coverage doesn't exceed the R-X maximum)?

With that said, my wife and I will be looking to do exactly what mister.shoes did as well (when we move in to Mpls proper), and I'd be curious to get some more specifics from you.

talindsay
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Re: Zoning in Minneapolis

Postby talindsay » August 20th, 2013, 1:45 pm

Funny that you're allowed to build a shitty, ugly garage with whatever siding, shingles, finishes you want but if you want to build juts a little bit higher you have to match to the main structure. :/ Obviously, it can be done, but the minimum unit size, other limitations, etc all make it a tad more difficult. Isn't it 686 ft^2 or 10% of lot area, whichever is greater (as long as total lot coverage doesn't exceed the R-X maximum)?

With that said, my wife and I will be looking to do exactly what mister.shoes did as well (when we move in to Mpls proper), and I'd be curious to get some more specifics from you.
The Minneapolis garage building code is very specific but not difficult to figure out. They even have a dedicated page for it:
http://www.minneapolismn.gov/mdr/exteri ... ior_garage


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