HOUSING STRATEGY

Housing Strategy | ENVISION FRANKLIN 37 The rapid growth of The City of Franklin and Williamson County requires thinking about planning strategically to accommodate housing demand. Implementing a housing strategy as part of the Envision Franklin update offers an important opportunity to explore how to manage this expected growth. KEY FINDINGS • Missing middle housing offers a valuable focus for housing options beyond single-family homes and large apartment buildings. • Managing impact fees strategically could help to encourage missing middle housing options and encourage priority development types. • Envision Franklin design concepts can be updated to support a greater variety of housing types. • More senior-friendly housing options are needed to accommodate an aging Baby Boomer population. Predictability in the development process is important for both local governments and developers. Streamlining the review and approvals process helps to make project development more efficient and to lower costs. ENCOURAGE WALKABLE, HUMAN SCALE BUILDING FORM Missing middle housing offers a valuable focus for housing options beyond single-family homes and large apartment buildings. Expanding by-right housing types will make it easier and less expensive to build additional options such as duplexes, cottage courts, and accessory dwelling units that fit easily into existing neighborhoods. • Duplexes: Homes that are compact and house-scale • Cottage clusters: Smaller single-family homes arranged to foster a sense of community • Accessory dwelling units: Offer flexible infill options in existing neighborhoods Zoning revisions may examine removing minimum lot size and setback requirements and instead carefully regulate building width and depth. Seeking opportunities to remove minimum parking requirements also helps dedicate more land towards housing and reduce development costs. Small-scale apartment buildings can also help diversify housing types while remaining cost-effective. In high-cost markets, the ideal building typology is between 8 and 12 units to be financially viable. This "magic number" allows developers to leverage economies of scale while using less expensive, wood frame construction, without elevators, depending on code requirements.xxv

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