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AUGUST 1992 " ,); c4r^. H5 • AMERICAN I , , °. PLANNING P A S Me MO ASSOCIATION • k i i•u Residential 42% fr Residential 52% Residential 40% I= Residential 48% , Commercial 3% Commercial 3% , M l,` ommercial 111% ; Commercial ill% • � ,� '', Industrial 8% `"� Industrial6% ' Industrial 7% Industrial 10% �' Public'Use 47% �� Public Use 51% Public Use 31% Public Use 32% Bringing Land-Use and land-use map will have the most insight into what forces brought the city to its current form and where it may be Ratios Into the '90s heading in the future. Land-use ratios are most useful to planners and developers By Christopher Harris involved in comprehensive planning and long-range development,because these data are necessary in determining Every municipality is responsible for guiding future growth. what mix of land uses should be encouraged in future The challenge is creating an appropriate mix of residential, decades. Also,developers building neotraditional towns, commercial,industrial,and public uses in the community. planned communities,and large-scale mixed-use One pivotal factor in this process is a solid understanding of developments on vacant land find ratios from other • the current pattern of land uses within municipal boundaries. communities to be a good basis for land-use allocation. Knowing what uses exist and what services are needed to It is interesting to note that the ratios from the planned provide for those uses can determine the type and location community of Columbia,Maryland, which was built in the of development that a municipality should plan for. early 1960s,nearly match all of the ratio averages from the This PAS Memo summarizes a 1992 survey of 1992 survey. land-use ratios in 66 municipalities.The American Planning Association undertook this study in response to the Current Data Are Important large number of requests that the Planning Advisory Service Development patterns change over time—even within a received for an update to a 1983 study. Part of this demand is decade—and land-use ratios need to be updated to reflect driven by the growing number of states that are mandating those changes accurately.This study will serve as an update cities and counties to do comprehensive planning.These to several surveys of land-use ratios done in preceding mandated plans must include an inventory of existing land decades. uses. The first major study was done by Harland Bartholomew Even in cities where planning is not required,there has and Jack Wood in 1955.They surveyed ratios over a 20-year been a significant number of comprehensive plan updates span and published their results in Land Uses In American in the last few years. Some of these communities may be Cities.Those ratios were used in a large number of the redoing their plan for the first time since the 701 era of federally funded 701 comprehensive plans. planning in the 1950s and 1960s. Land-use trends and A second study,by Eisner and Associates,examined ratios settlement patterns have changed significantly since that compiled between 1939 and 1985.The usefulness of this data time,causing noticeable changes in the land-use mix for comprehensive planning purposes is compromised by the and a need for updated ratios. fact that the researchers analyzed ratios over a 46-year span. Too many development trends altered land-use ratios over Who Uses Land-Use Ratios? that period. Eisner's ranges include both pre-and post-World Land-use ratios refer to the breakdown of various categories War II residential settlement patterns,which are vastly of land as a percentage of the total amount of land in a different. community. After a land-use survey,the results are mapped Yet another survey of 22 large American cities was done or entered into a computer and total land acreage for each in 1973.The results of that study were printed in Urban Land category is tallied. Policies and Land-use Control Measures(Vol. VI,Northern Because the ratios are derived from acreage totals,0 America). they do not represent the spatial patterns of cities. Spatial Finally,the most recent comprehensive look at these ratios arrangements of land uses typically are portrayed on a land- was a 1983 survey by Gregory Longhini and Mike Sutton. use map. Planners who understand both their land-use ratios Published by the APA, it quantified land-use ratios from