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Nebraska
Popular Omaha by Design Plan Gets Green Light from City Council
With Omaha Community Foundation researchers finding eight years ago that Omahans want the city to be ''connected, smart, significant, sparkling and fun,'' its public-private Lively Omaha group and the national Project for Public Spaces (PPS) have jointly drawn up a long-range comprehensive Omaha by Design plan, whose public success inspired the group to assume that name, and now the City Council has affirmed the new urban course with a 7-0 vote for a landmark package of zoning code revisions and additions to make the public wishes come true.
Under the code changes, reports Omaha World-Herald writer Karen Sloan, large retail buildings will have brick or stone facades, large windows and human-scale signs.
In commercial centers, their grouping must create pedestrian-friendly plazas and other public spaces, their tall retaining walls must be terraced and parking lots landscaped. Major intersection corners must include green spaces instead of commercial buildings.
Established neighborhoods can create their own preservation plans or special zoning districts, with the city's new ''walkable neighborhood'' zoning category ensuring different housing styles and links to commercial areas.
The city's new Design Review Board will assist the city planning director on all related matters. ''This package will truly shape the look and feel of all parts of our city,'' stated Mayor Mike Fahey. ''No longer will Omaha be subject to someone else's design standards.''
A member of the code revision oversight team, developer Jay Noddle, said many of his colleagues welcome the requirements as equally applicable to all.
''These guidelines will hold us all to a higher standard,'' he noted. ''We're going to have a set of world-class design standards for a world-class city in the future.''
While some of the guidelines, including those for large retail store design, are taking effect within two weeks, the implementation of others will take much longer, with Planning Director Steve Jensen cautioning, ''It will be 15 or 20 years before we see the full effect in the city.''
Omaha by Design Director Connie Spellman points out that some developers have been proactive.
Citing the mixed-use Aksarben Village and Midtown Crossing developments and a planned Wal-Mart store with improved design and a terraced retaining wall, she said, ''The big boxes are already asking us, 'What do you want?'''
Indeed, it was the city's previous Wal-Mart that became a catalyst for the better design initiative, the writer observes, quoting Council President Dan Welch.
''I remember their architect saying, 'This is Omaha, and you don't have a code that forces us to do (a more attractive store design),''' he recalled. ''There will never be another big box store that comes in and says that.'' -- Omaha World-Herald 8/14/2007
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