Innovative City Planner Oversees Ventura's Urban Development

Anne, you joined the City of Ventura as the Manager of Urban Development at the end of 2004. What were you doing prior to that?

I was renovating a building in Vicksburg, Mississippi, where I had been head of community planning. Prior to that, I had been with Placemakers, which is an urban design and planning firm out of Miami. It's actually a virtual firm with seven members who are all around the country and who come together for coding and planning projects.

I have been planning director twice previously: once in Vicksburg and once in Monroe, Louisiana, which is my hometown. My educational background is actually in architecture and I have an interior design degree. I consider myself a self-taught planner. I did do some graduate work in planning, but could not find the graduate program in physical planning that I really desired.

In terms of my planning approach, I consider myself a flaming new urbanist and am proud of it.

You have also described yourself as a smart code evangelist. How do smart codes differ from conventional zoning?

The most important difference between smart codes and conventional zoning is that smart codes are much more concerned with actual outcomes of buildings and how development affects the urban realm. Zoning tends to be concerned with use alone. A smart code is generally a combination of a zoning code and a subdivision regulation, meaning that it is more concerned with how development relates to surrounding development and how it looks, feels and shapes the urban realm.

For generations and generations we understood how to build cities. We've lost that knowledge because we have been relying almost exclusively on use zoning that separates the daily activities of life. These activities really need to coexist and be interrelated to make communities successful economically, environmentally, and in every other way.

What has the reception been like with regard to the implementation of smart codes in Ventura?

I think that we have to start from the understanding that, since we have had zoning in place for about 70 years, it is not just the codes that regulate development. There are many interrelated specialists that affect development. Our financial models, our systems of mortgage financing, the way that we insure property, the way we market real estate, all of this is completely different from what it once was when development was something that every community welcomed. This is going to be a very difficult process because there is so much that has to be changed.

If you can change zoning codes, though, I think that the other systems will come along. I think that people will understand how to insure more mixed use. They will understand how to finance it. Banks are now discovering that new urbanism started as a market response to private development that was stifled by conventional zoning regulations. Once a good project has come on line and the banks have started learning how to finance it, and once the insurers have come on board, the real estate market will too. I firmly believe that we are at the tipping point. People are saying that what has been built for the past seventy years is not only economically unsustainable, but it is environmentally unsustainable, and it is just downright ugly to be perfectly blunt. It is not what communities want to see.

It is very important to understand that in order to protect the natural environment we have to make cities attractive, wonderful places where people want to be. We need to make building cities legal again, so that we can protect all forms of habitat, natural habitats and human habitats as well.

We've talked with City Manager Rick Cole a few times in the past and he has commented that good planning is about vision. What is the overall planning vision for Ventura?

There is a tremendous commitment here politically and socially across the spectrum to what this city has actually envisioned, which is protection of historic resources, protection of our urban fabric, protection of our agricultural lands, and protection of some of the more beautiful natural resources that we have in our community. At the same time, there is also a commitment to intensify development in areas that we know are under-built, in order to create the housing that we currently lack and create jobs, while developing more efficient transportation systems. These are the elements of a successful human habitat.

You have commented that the 101 Freeway is ugly and should be put underground. Could you elaborate on the role of transportation in making communities?

Individual people in their individual cars cannot be the sole or primary mode of transportation; we've seen the results of that approach. I am very surprised that California is not way ahead of the rest of the country in terms of public transportation. I'm almost appalled at the lack of it here. It is not just the lack of public transportation, but also the lack of the coordination among the various transportation systems into an integrated whole. Consider that every single public transportation trip begins and ends with a walk, a pedestrian. We need a whole integrated system so that the walk from one area would connect to a bus to somewhere, which would connect to a regional rail, and again connect to a state rail system. This applies to regional goods as well.

In your previous work have you helped other municipalities implement smart codes and form based zoning?

I have not implemented smart codes before coming to Ventura. I have been teaching a smart codes workshop. What I'm learning is that planners around the country are extremely frustrated. They know that the current zoning codes are absolutely not working, that we need an alternative, and that in most cases there is not the political will to develop the alternative. I think that in Ventura, however, there is the political will to really create something that is wonderful.

Form based codes are being adopted around the country. I know that communities right now are doing everything they can to learn how to do it, but we're in the beginning of the process. Austin, Texas is an early innovator and has for the last two years been learning about form-based codes and what the legal ramifications for adopting a new code are. We are talking about throwing out a system that has been in place for seventy years. That has a lot of legal inertia behind it, but, again, I think we are at the tipping point. Innovative cities are going to pave the way for the other cities, and I hope Ventura is one of the first to implement smart codes.

How is the development community viewing this impending change? Are people with vested property rights anxious or are developers anticipating greater flexibility under smart codes?

There is undoubtedly more flexibility with smart codes than with current zoning codes. Once you put aside the idea that you can only do one thing with your property, you have many more options. Form based codes determine the building form. We all know from looking at gorgeous historic areas that a lot can happen in one building if the building is built to last. Yet, what happens inside those buildings can change. For a property owner that means wonderful things. So far, I think that property owners are apprehensive about changing laws. To be honest, I would be apprehensive too if the regulations that deal with my private property rights were changing. However, I think that because there will be so much flexibility, when people really understand what form based codes can do for them and the opportunities created, they will be clamoring to put these codes in place. I have no doubt about that.

How far along are you in the process of implementing smart codes?

Right now we are thinking about how far we want to take our code. The form based code really only works at the level of the lot and block. They affect how the building relates to the site, where it is placed on the site, how the parking is accessed, and what the mass and height of the building is like. Form based codes are not detailed enough to deal with stylistic issues. So, there is an opportunity to go further.

Instituting a transect-based planning approach is something that I think would also be incredibly valuable for Ventura. The transect approach forces a community to think about every opportunity and need in the human habitat, from wilderness areas to urban cores, and try to include those opportunities in every community and every neighborhood. I would like to see Ventura go one step further than form based codes and consider how it can use the transect as the guiding principle and framework.

What is your timeline for this process?

I hope that we will have something in place within two years. We are currently evaluating proposals and deciding exactly what it is we want to do. We should make those decisions in the next few months and we'll begin work as soon as we get our general plan in place.

In closing, do there appear to be challenges to implementing smart codes and other new urbanist approaches that are unique to California?

I don't believe that there is anywhere that this could work better than in California, because there is such sensitivity to environmental issues here. I'm very surprised that we still have use based zoning in a place that is so highly protective of its natural habitat.

CEQA of course, is a challenge. I think it is terribly misguided. It doesn't look at integrated planning and it really doesn't recognize the fact that the only way you can really protect the natural habitat is by making the human habitat extremely desirable. That means building cities. That means caring very much about what is built and not allowing all of these tremendous subdivisions of single uses and large lot zoning. There is nothing that destroys land or consumes land faster than that, especially when it is not connected to all the other needs that humans have: places to work, shop, live and eat. It has to be a fully integrated community or else it is going to create stall.