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• INTRODUCTION The City of Fort Collins adopted a moratorium on large retail developments to study the community impacts of the"superstore"phenomenon in more detail and to provide the community with clear and enforceable policies to mitigate those impacts. The moratorium provided the opportunity to review existing retail developments with community-wide or regional impacts and to set standards for future developments to ensure that future development fits with the expectations and meets the needs of the community. . • These standards and guidelines are a response to dissatisfaction with corporate chain marketing strategy dictating design that is indifferent to local identity and interests.The main goal is to encourage development that contributes to Fort Collins as a unique place by reflecting its physical character and adding to it in appropriate ways. Large retail developments depend on high visibility from major public streets. In turn,their design determines much of the character and attractiveness of major streetscapes in the city. The marketing interests of many corporations, even with strong image-making design by professional designers, can be potentially detrimental to community aspirations and sense of place when they result in massive individual developments that do not contribute to or integrate with the city in a positive way. Fort Collins already has a development review system that promotes solutions to these general issues. The purpose of these standards and guidelines is to augment those existing criteria with more . specific interpretations that apply to the design of large retail store developments. These standards and guidelines require a basic level of architectural variety, compatible scale, pedestrian and bicycle access, and mitigation of negative impacts. The standards are by no means intended to limit creativity; it is the City's hope that they will serve as a useful tool for design professionals engaged in site specific design in context. They are placed within the framework of the Land Development Guidance System which provides for variance from the requirements if the proposal is equal to or better than the City requirements.