Eliminating Minimum Lot Areas for Multifamily 

• This bill eliminates minimum lot areas for multifamily districts.  Generally, it is necessary under current rules to have a certain lot size in order to permit multifamily housing on a property.  This makes it difficult to fit multifamily housing on the small lots most common in our urban areas and forces multifamily development out into our suburban and rural areas which have larger lots.  This bill does not change the actual size of lots, rezone any lots, change lot coverage percent requirements, nor density requirements itself (which remains proportionate based on the size of the lot).  What this bill does do is define the size of a lot that is allowed to fit multifamily housing if the community wished to zone it that way. 
• The end goal of this bill is to provide communities the flexibility to fit (or not fit) multifamily housing where it makes the most sense for them.  This is a often an issue for Nashville's urban areas which may welcome multifamily housing in certain locations but are not permitted to accommodate them based on this provision in the zoning code, meaning such projects currently continue to be pushed out to other areas and adds pressure to build more housing in more rural or suburban settings, contributing to urban sprawl and pressures on existing neighborhoods.
  • Current Status: this bill has been indefinitely deferred to wait for the conclusion of a study being conducted by Planning to determine if this would have an effect on storm water.