This interesting — and kind of funny — story has been circulating: “Judge’s ruling means Charlottesville has no zoning laws whatsoever right now.”
What happened? Is the counter-Euclid revolution underway? Did the judge rediscover Nectow? Did Charlottesville voters decide to go Full Houston?
No, nothing quite as dramatic. The story notes that the city’s attempt to adopt a new zoning code was held invalid. But, the story notes, the former zoning ordinance was repealed so that the new one could be adopted. With the former code ineffective and the new code invalidated … just like that, no zoning!
We haven’t checked, but we would not be surprised if the most popular search on WEXIS right now in the Blue Ridge is “Virginia /s vested /s rights or ‘estoppel.'”
In the meantime, the city has stopped processing new development applications, while claiming this is all just a technical glitch. We can’t possibly imagine a world without zoning, can we?
Come on, Charlottesville, make some lemonade out of this. You have a chance to show what you can do! Be creative, think big and outside-the-zoning-box! Ring the City of Houston’s Legal Department — they are waiting for your call!
Learn more on this interesting situation from Christian Britschgi, “NIMBY Lawsuit Accidentally Abolished City’s Entire Zoning Code” (Reason) (“In other words, a NIMBY lawsuit challenging a slightly more liberal zoning code has resulted in complete zoning abolition.).
While Charlottesville figures out how to fix this self-created glitch, we’ll be busy researching legislative savings clauses.