City to Consider New Rules to Supersize Development Near Transit Hubs

A Thursday commission vote authorizing a new land-use designation will kick off a far-reaching program to bring the city’s zoning code more in line with county rules that encourage taller, denser buildings up to one mile from fixed-rail stations such as Metrorail.

The Miami City Commission will vote Thursday on the first phase of a far-reaching plan to dramatically increase development densities in neighborhoods that surround Metrorail stations and other transit hubs.

The plan, as outlined by city planning officials, would allow, under some conditions, high-rise towers as tall as 12 stories on properties now limited to five, and more than double that in other areas. 

Officials say the changes are necessary to provide a city-backed development alternative within neighborhoods where Miami-Dade County zoning rules supersede the city’s more restrictive code. 

Those county rules, known as Rapid Transit Zoning or RTZ, have been criticized by both residents and city officials for promoting unchecked growth that is out-of-scale with surrounding areas.  

Thursday’s vote — to create a new transit-linked zoning designation known as Transit Oriented Nodes — will be paired with pending zoning rule changes that planners have dubbed Transit Station Neighborhood Development, or TSND.

City planning department officials declined to answer questions about the proposed plan, citing Thursday’s commission vote. Miami District 2 Commissioner Damian Pardo did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the Spotlight.

If approved Thursday, the measure would raise minimum housing densities from 36 units per acre to 150 per acre on properties that receive the new Transit Oriented Node (TON) designation. Densities on some properties would top out at 500 units per acre. 

Within Coconut Grove, properties within one mile of the Coconut Grove Metrorail Station at U.S. 1 SW 27^th Avenue, the Douglas Road Station at U.S. 1 and SW 37^th Avenue, and the Vizcaya Metrorail Station on South Miami near U.S. 1 could be impacted by the changes.

Other neighborhoods falling within the one-mile radius of those stations include Brickell, Shenandoah and The Roads.

While single family neighborhoods would not be affected, properties presently zoned T4 and above – covering large stretches of the Grove’s key commercial corridors along Grand Avenue, Bird Avenue, Douglas Road and 27^th Avenue — would be eligible for the new TON designation.

For properties to receive the new Transit Oriented Node designation, separate neighborhood-by-neighborhood commission approval will be necessary. The first of those – a 144-acre tract in Miami’s Little River area – is bundled into Thursday’s legislation.

Also separate from Thursday’s vote are the changes to Miami’s zoning code, known as Miami 21, which will provide the specific rules and programs developers must follow to increase building height and housing density under the city plan.

Those proposed code changes – shared with commissioners in May – will be up for commission approval perhaps as early as this month, city planners have indicated.

Following a hearing last month by the city’s Planning, Zoning and Appeals Board to consider the new legislation, city planning officials said they were unable to quantify the potential impact of the city’s new transit-linked development initiative.

“Right now, I have no tools to be able to do that,” Planning Department Assistant Director Sevanne Steiner told board members. “There’s nothing really within our comprehensive plan, other than a few pieces of goals, policies, and objectives, and there’s nothing really in Miami 21, that allows me to do the type of analysis.”

That uncertainty prompted board member Paul Mann to question whether zoning and land-use changes so profound should occur only through a citywide voter referendum. 

“The changes you’re looking to push forward are so major that people living by these developments are really going to be affected and they don’t know what kind of hammer is going to hit them,” Mann suggested to Steiner and other city planning officials. “They just don’t. They don’t understand.”