Tommy Washbush
Linda Horvath.
City of Madison planner Linda Horvath: 'People do want to see, generally speaking, more walkable neighborhoods — [they] want to be able to walk to shops and services.'
On an overcast day in April with rain threatening, city of Madison planners Linda Horvath and Colin Punt walk through the neighborhood near Whitney Way and Regent Street where they had just recommended several changes in land use and zoning in a controversial draft of a new plan for the city’s west side.
It was a few weeks after Horvath and Punt had tried to present the plan at a contentious public meeting, where some west-side residents groaned and booed to show their displeasure. The West Area Plan was the first of 12 area plans drafted and released as part of the city’s new planning framework and covers the area of Madison between Midvale Boulevard and the Beltline.
Isthmus asked city planning staff to tour part of the West Area where several changes in land use and zoning had been recommended to better understand the plan’s details and intent. We walk along Whitney Way toward two churches at the corner of Regent Street, one of the sites that became a point of contention in the draft plan. Despite the new bus rapid transit stop being built nearby, the empty church parking lots surrounded by single family homes gave the area a sleepy feel.
“This block right here is one we are recommending for a change in the future land use, and also a proactive rezoning to [neighborhood mixed use],” says Punt. In the middle of a large area of the city devoted only to residential development, there aren’t many places where the shops, restaurants, and other amenities that make up a walkable neighborhood are allowed.
“This was a good location along the BRT, right at a stop, with a couple of large properties in a location that isn’t well served by amenities and services to include those things,” says Punt.
If the churches close, sell, or look to redevelop, as has increasingly been happening in Madison and across the country, this corner could be where a new development with a mix of uses might make sense.
“We could maybe look to something like Sequoya Commons,” says Horvath about what the plan suggests if those properties redevelop in the future. Sequoya Commons, a four-story mixed-use development on Midvale Boulevard that opened in phases starting in 2008, includes Sequoya Library, 145 units of housing, and several restaurants and stores on the ground floor where the Midvale Plaza strip mall used to be. “You have the ice cream shop and the restaurants and the library there.”
But that vision would soon be scrapped, at least in part.
The pushback that Horvath and other city planners faced at the March meeting prompted several proposed changes in the west area and has had ripple effects across the city.
In May, the city announced it was scrapping its recommendations for proactive rezoning of the churches along Whitney Way, Mount Olive Lutheran Church and Red Village Church, and part of the land use changes for the area. Planners also walked back proactive rezoning recommendations in the Highlands neighborhood and other land use changes in response to the opposition.
“Rather than being addressed proactively in this planning process, rezoning requests would be addressed if and when they are proposed,” the city said in a news release announcing the changes. “Proactive rezoning has only been incorporated into planning processes in the last few years, and the city is continuing to evaluate how much detail to include in area plans.”
Under proactive rezoning, the city initiates a zoning change to better align with how the land is expected to be used in the future. Without it, developers have to apply and be approved for a zoning change in order to build something other than what is allowed under current zoning.
Tommy Washbush
Colin Punt.
City planner Colin Punt makes the case that proactive rezoning is about preparing for Madison’s future.
City staffers have also pulled some proactive rezoning recommendations from the draft Northeast Area Plan.
“Because of some discussion about proactive rezoning from the West Area team, we decided to do the same kind of approach,” city of Madison planner Angela Puerta tells Isthmus. “After [West Area] residents’ initial reaction, the Northeast Area Plan team decided to withdraw all recommended proactive rezoning areas that were at residential parcels.”
Dan McAuliffe, a planner who worked on the Northeast Area Plan, says the goal of proactive rezoning is to make the “approval processes for the type of development that’s envisioned by the plan a little simpler. We’re not trying to push anybody out, we’re trying to make the transition easier in the future.”
Even with recommendations for proactive rezoning near residential areas removed, planners kept in land use changes near Thompson Drive and Portage Road that would encourage slightly more density in residential areas, allowing “missing middle” housing types like duplexes and townhomes.
Both West Area and Northeast Area plans will incorporate public feedback into a final draft before going before a variety of city boards, commissions, and committees this summer and fall where further revisions could happen before being approved by the city council. Even if proactive rezoning recommendations are approved in the plans, those changes would then go through their own public approval process before becoming official.
Jaymes Langrehr, the public information officer for the city’s Department of Planning, Community and Economic Development, says the planning department isn’t yet sure if the changed approach to proactive rezoning will continue throughout the city’s entire area planning effort. Work has not yet begun on the next two plans in line, the Southeast Area Plan and the Southwest Area Plan, but will start this year.
“We don't know what any of the recommendations from those planning teams will be yet — including how (or if) they will handle any potential proactive rezoning in those areas,” says Langrehr. “Even though we can't speculate on potential recommendations, the planning division as a whole will be evaluating the recommendations and processes included in the first two plans and apply the things they learned to future plans.”
During our neighborhood stroll, Horvath and Punt made the case that proactive rezoning is about preparing for Madison’s future. “People do want to see, generally speaking, more walkable neighborhoods — [they] want to be able to walk to shops and services,” says Horvath. Those shops and services have to go somewhere, and the recommended land use and zoning changes are “in response to some of those types of comments.”
[Editor's note: This article has been updated to correctly identify city planner Colin Punt, who was originally identified as Ben Zellers.]
