‘Closer and higher’: Durham becomes 9th largest city in US to end required parking

Durham ended parking mandates for new development and made it easier to build housing and businesses inside the city limits in a package of zoning reforms that narrowly passed the City Council late Monday night.

“Parking mandates are really ruinous to small businesses and small projects,” said Aaron Lubeck, a local designer-builder who helped write the reforms.

Supporters of eliminating parking minimums say it will reduce pollution and free land in the city center for the housing, green spaces and shops that cities need to connect residents and limit suburban sprawl.

“Parking is not going away,” Lubeck emphasized. “Private businesses will still provide parking, whether it’s restaurants, coffee shops, nonprofits, coworking spaces, whatever, and all that’s fine. It’s just parking mandates.”

The Bull City joins Raleigh and dozens of other communities in eliminating required parking. According to the Parking Reform Network, Durham is the ninth largest city in the U.S. to do so, joining the likes of Austin, Texas; San Francisco, California; and Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Monday’s vote, arriving at nearly midnight, followed four hours of debate in the last meeting before the newly elected City Council takes office next month.

The council eliminated a handful of controversial items from the zoning reforms proposed by developers before taking a single vote on the rest, the vast majority of which came recommended by the planning department. Here is how the council voted:

• For: Leonardo Williams (mayor-elect); Javiera Caballero (re-elected this year); Mayor Pro Tem Mark-Anthony Middleton (in the middle of his term); and Jillian Johnson (leaving office after eight years).

• Against: Mayor Elaine O’Neal (leaving office after two years); DeDreana Freeman (in the middle of her term); and Monique Holsey-Hyman (not re-elected).

“We have to make the choice (of) what our city’s going to look like,” Middleton said. “We’re going to get closer and higher. ... That’s what all the great metropolises around our country look like.”

But critics said the reforms won’t come even close to addressing Durham’s affordable housing crisis.

“It’s not five units, here or there. It’s actually thousands and those units need to be permanently affordable,” Freeman said. “I’m not vested in this at all.”

The meeting was tense and chaotic at times, with speakers saying council members had already made up their minds and that the opposing camps were too far apart.

“I’m so glad I’m leaving y’all tonight,” O’Neal concluded.

The arguments

Raleigh-based developer Jim Anthony submitted the lengthy rewrite of the code called SCAD — short for Simplifying Codes for Affordable Development — in May 2022 on behalf of a team of people working in local real estate.

Its 60 pages of code amendments were vehemently opposed by homeowners in the InterNeighborhood Council of Durham (INC).

INC President Mimi Kessler blasted the changes Monday night as “unrealistic and extreme.”

“It increases developer opportunities at the expense of the quality of life of ordinary people,” said Tom Miller, an influential homeowner who once served on the Planning Commission. “For the vast majority of people in Durham, their interest in planning and zoning is the protection of their homes.”

Middleton said he was alarmed to see residents of the “three or four neighborhoods in the city that look exactly the way they looked in the 1950s” stoking gentrification fears among those in working-class communities.

“The problem (for those people) is not what SCAD is going to do to Black neighborhoods that have already been catching it. Part of the concern is what SCAD is going to allow to happen in neighborhoods that have not changed. Watch that,” Middleton warned. “I would just caution my friends to watch where you’re getting your talking points from.”

Many of those opposed to the reforms simply didn’t trust the people who wrote them.

“SCAD’s proponents are large developers, landlords and real estate investors,” said Donna Frederick, a homeowner who warns gentrification will intensify under the changes.

The authors burned bridges with Habitat for Humanity, an organization whose name appeared on the initial application. The organization withdrew its support months ago and board Chair Carleena Deonanan said Monday night they oppose the reforms procedurally and substantively.

“We were fooled into this,” Deonanan said. “Our heart is broken because we trusted these people.”

Other argued the reforms won’t make Durham more affordable.

“Lowering a developer’s costs is no guarantee that housing will become more affordable,” said Stephen Knill who helps lead the Leesville Road Coalition, a group of Southeast Durham homeowners.

But proponents of zoning reform argued the scale of the affordable housing problem doesn’t mean leaders should throw up their hands when presented with incremental solutions.

“Doing something is better than doing nothing,” small-scale developer Topher Thomas said.

“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” added Steve Toler, who has advised the team behind SCAD.

Those in favor of the reforms say they will help small-scale developers get creative.

“There are a lot of people doing good things here in Durham in housing, and quite a few of them are in this room,” said Tiffany Elder, a local Realtor and builder.

“Many with my training learn in school about the innumerable benefits of building healthy walkable communities, only to join the profession and spend their hours doing uninspired yet code-compliant suburban sprawl,” said planner and landscape architect Brian Vaughn. “The amendments will unlock a renaissance of homegrown urban design.”

Ryan Hurley, co-owner of downtown clothing shop Vert & Vogue, said he believes zoning reform will be good for local retailers, who create jobs and help define the culture.

“We don’t have enough small-scale commercial buildings,” Hurley said. “The more of these spaces we have, the lower rents will be and the more likely our local business owners will be able to buy their space. ... Corporate developers will not do this.”

On the subject of parking minimums, Lubeck said a typical parking space requires about 400 square feet, which can ruin opportunities for shared gardens and courtyards in small neighborhoods, worsening stormwater runoff.

He recalled a 7,000-square-foot building outside downtown, where a restaurant about the size of Mateo could have gone, had the city not required 70 parking spaces.

“Which is crazy,” Lubeck said. “I mean, literally, you’d have to knock down six or seven homes around your restaurant just to comply with the code.”

What is in SCAD?

Here’s what SCAD, which takes effect in the city limits Jan. 1, will do:

• Eliminate minimum parking requirements.

• Establish minimum densities of five to eight residential units per acre in commercial and office zones and eliminate maximum residential densities there.

• Allow places of worship to build accessory dwelling units for anyone, not just their staff, and places some limits on their location and level of review.

• Require projects with over 100 units to have at least 5,000 square feet of civic or commercial space.

• Allow planned residential developments that incorporate commercial or office uses to build the components in any order.

More changes encourage infill, which is the process of developing vacant or under-used parcels in urban areas:

• Eliminates site plan review when there are 10 or fewer townhomes and 20 or fewer ADUS.

• Reduces the buffers required around some residential projects.

• Permits a new housing type, the “detached rowhouse,” a hybrid between a townhome and single-family house.

• Allows ADUs to be built closer to the road and increases the maximize size of an ADU from 800 square feet to 1,000 square feet on single-story units and 1,200 square feet on multiple stories.

• Allows any lot with a structure built before 1950 to be subdivided into small lots. Planning staff say this will help save old homes from demolition.

• Changes many other limitations around yards, driveways, garages and lot size for infill development. There is special emphasis on the requirements restricting corner and flag-shaped lots.

Some zoning reforms too controversial

The City Council only voted on the items that the city’s planning staff recommended.

They rejected the rest but will consider additional changes over the next two years as the city’s Unified Development Ordinance is rewritten (a process already underway):

Here’s what was eliminated before the vote:

• A new affordable housing incentive program, which would have exempted smaller projects from reviews if 25% of the units were affordable for 15 years.

• Letting housing be built in areas with light industrial zoning, where it isn’t allowed today.

• Allowing an ADU to be built first, before a primary structure.

• Some other tweaks that the planning department was uncertain about.

The Board of County Commissioners could extend the changes countywide.

The reforms will tentatively be heard by them Dec. 11, according to planning staff.