TRANSECT-BASED REGULATING PLANS

All images are available for free download for use in PowerPoint (low resolution) or print (high resolution), with credit as noted.

Available here are transect-based regulating plans (zoning maps) and T-zoned master plans by several prominent New Urbanist town planning firms. Most use the lilac-purple color scheme that distinguishes Transect Zones from the bright yellow-orange-red palette of conventional separated-use zoning. (Sometimes they must appear on the same map.) The gradation in color from low to high T-zones makes it obvious where the neighborhood center is and where the higher density is to support it. Note that usually the same T-zone is applied on both sides of a street, so "like faces like" and an immersive environment is maintained.


thumb space Florida City 1992
One of the earliest of DPZ's transect-based plans, the Florida City map doesn't show the T-zone colors, but the names of the zones are very similar to those used now. The zones are marked only along the thoroughfares but would apply to platted lots enfronting them. A code for frontage types only could be marked in this way. The letters refer to later more detailed maps of those blocks. Workplace is shown as a separated use, as in a company town, but is walkable from much of the community.

Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company

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Salado, Texas
Adjacent to the Village of Salado's historic district, in an area experiencing increasing development pressure, lies a sizable piece of family land where the well-traveled owner sought a model that would honor central Texas' legacy of German settlements. In response, the consultants designed a new village of two distinct neighborhoods.

PlaceMakers LLC

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Florence Gardens, Gulfport, MS
Already in development as a conventional subdivision when the Gulfport SmartCode became available, Florence Gardens changed course. PlaceMakers redesigned the project and redirected their marketing. They're now positioned to be the first Gulf Coast TND selling lots post-Katrina.

PlaceMakers LLC

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Handsboro, Gulfport, MS
Gulfport's citywide SmartCode was adopted in February 2007 as an option for development in its communities and neighborhoods. Handsboro is the third existing community in Gulfport to make the SmartCode mandatory within its boundaries. Its Community Plan was adopted as an integral part of the City's SmartCode in February 2008. The Regulating Plan depicts the boundaries of the planning area, assigns the new Transect zones, and features new overlay districts such as transportation and retail corridors, density-receiving areas and neighborhood conservation districts.

Hall Alminana, Inc.

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Montgomery Downtown Plan
The SmartCode was adopted in 2007 as the municipal zoning code for the heart of historic Montgomery, Alabama. The year before, it had been adopted as an option for developers with certain minimum acreage in other parts of the city, after having been calibrated for a greenfield town called Hampstead in 2005. Although Montgomery is a state capital, its densest urbanism is coded only as T5. This reflects the generally low-rise character of the downtown, and allows for possible future succession to T6.

Dover, Kohl & Partners

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Paso Robles, California
Moule & Polyzoides has been creating master plans and their associated regulating plans based on local transects for many years. This Olsen Ranch Beechwood Specific Plan for a 471-acre site at the perimeter of Paso Robles, adjacent to vineyards, is notable for its abundant civic space and parklands. While conventional planning often ignores the need to connect neighborhoods across such areas, this plan provides excellent connectivity. The firm has also completed a transect-based plan for a 245-block planning area in historic Uptown Paso Robles.

Moule & Polyzoides

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Repaupo, Logan Township, New Jersey
This regulating plan takes an attenuated 403-acre site with high potential for separated-use sprawl and instead zones for several Villages at Repaupo while preserving 200 acres in their natural state, equivalent to the T1 Natural Zone. Note the rural-to-urban transect from Edge to Center for each Village. The Town Center Zone, equivalent to a locally calibrated T6, is located where it can serve the nearby Villages as well as traffic from the adjacent major thoroughfares.

Moule & Polyzoides

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San Antonio River North
A Master Plan with a Form Based Code and a detailed implementation strategy was produced to transform this under-performing mixed industrial area into vital downtown neighborhoods along the extended RiverWalk immediately north of downtown San Antonio. Key elements include transforming Broadway from a wide highway to an urban street with generous sidewalks and a streetcar line, dense residential streets flanking the river, neighborhood preservation and infill along the edges of the plan area, a new performing arts district anchored by rehabilitated historic auditoriums adjoining the downtown, and a major new plaza fronting the San Antonio Museum of Art on the river.

Moule & Polyzoides

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Benicia, California
This regulating plan is based on a Master Plan and Form-Based Code for an 80-acre portion of the Downtown Benicia Historic District. The Master Plan provides design recommendations to revitalize problematic areas and maintain the centrality of the First Street mixed-use district, linking it physically and programmatically to the nearby artist community in the Arsenal that has a national draw. The Form-Based Code amends existing zoning to preserve the City's remaining historic building fabric and to require that new construction is compatible.

Opticos Design, Inc.

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Saucier, Harrison County, Mississippi
Three maps comprise the proposed official Regulating Plan for the town of Saucier. Saucier is currently an unincorporated rural hamlet, but the area is expecting intense growth pressure as people move off the Gulf Coast inland to this intersection of existing and proposed highways. This image shows the first map, identifying transect zones, special districts, land reserved for civic purposes and land reserved for shared parking purposes. Available in the complete Saucier Town Plan (26 MB download), the second map identifies required or recommended special features, and the third map identifies the various thoroughfare types to be built for the newly intensified town.

Andrews University Urban Design Studio

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Tornagrain Scotland
Tornagrain
is a 250-hectare greenfield project near Inverness, with excellent transport links and the adjacent Airport Business Park promising 5000 new jobs. The area is experiencing intense growth pressures - Tornagrain will be home to 10,000 people. Because of its size, Tornagrain was planned with several pedestrian sheds. Note that the percentage of T3, where the larger lots are, is quite small compared to many American TND projects.

Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company

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Natural Transects

Rural-Urban Transects

Pop-Culture Transects

Transect Analysis Tools

Photographs

Transects of American Cities

International Transects

Regional Transects and Sector Plans

Transect-Based Regulating Plans

Thoroughfare Transects