Northborough Comprehensive Zoning Revision - Community Opportunities Group, Inc.

COG’s work for the Town of Northborough began with housing and economic development planning services in 2004. When the Planning Board obtained funds to update the Northborough Zoning Bylaw three years later, COG was invited back to help implement many of the recommendations in the 2004 plan.

With guidance from an interdepartmental Zoning Advisory Committee, COG drafted several zoning amendments for local review. However, it became clear to us and the Town that the Zoning Bylaw needed more than section-level updates. As a result, the Planning Board authorized us to proceed with a comprehensive zoning revision. We worked with the Zoning Advisory Committee and Planning Board for more than two years, preparing multiple drafts and “before-and-after” comparison documents that helped to inform the public about the zoning changes under consideration. We studied the boundaries of every zoning district and recommended adjustments to eliminate land use conflicts and address problems such as the prevalence of split lots. In addition, the Planning Board commissioned us to conduct a detailed study of the southwest part of town, which had been zoned for uses that the land would not support well without a radical alteration of the natural landscape.

Town Meeting adopted the new Zoning Bylaw and Zoning Map in April 2009. It includes incentives for open space-residential design, multi-family housing in the downtown area and other designated locations along Main Street, and a special neighborhood transition district to facilitate residential reuse of an older industrial area between downtown and outlying residential neighborhoods. The new bylaw also reduces off-street parking requirements and provides for a more robust site plan review process.