There are three ways a community can use the Toolkit. The first option is for the local legislative body to adopt the Toolkit in its entirety as a full development code. The second option allows a local legislative body with an adopted zoning or subdivision ordinance to adopt either the zoning or subdivision elements of the Toolkit in their entirety. The third option involves the third option involves the local legislative body adopting one or more of the tools in the Toolkit as independent ordinances.

Implementation Option 1: Adopt the entire Toolkit
This is the preferred approach. The Toolkit was written as a model code consisting of a collection of regulatory modules which are interwoven to complement each other. This option will require your community to have an established community vision and to prepare a context area plan of your community.

Implementation Option 2: Adopt the Zoning or Subdivision Portions Only
This approach functions much like the first but the Toolkit is bifurcated and either the zoning or the subdivision component of the Toolkit is extracted and adopted as a stand-alone ordinance. This option, like the first, will require your community to have an established community vision and to prepare a context area plan of your community.

Implementation Option 3: Adopt One or More of the Toolkit’s Modules
While feasible, the “a’ la carte” approach is less desirable because it is more difficult to successfully calibrate the modules once they are taken out of the framework of the Toolkit’s context areas. There are, however, a few components within the Toolkit which are more independent in nature and are capable of standing alone without the context areas. Such compontents may include historic preservation, landscaping, signage, and parking.

Community Visioning and Context Planning

Depending on which implementation option your community chooses there may be additional visioning or planning exercises that your community will require. While all three options are possibilities options 1 & 2 are the preferred approaches and the most effective way to realize the full benefits of the Toolkit. An explanation of the visioning and the context area planning process is featured below. The Center for Planning Excellence (CPEX) is available to help communities through these planning exercises.

Because the Toolkit is organized using seven distinct contexts it is imperative that a community choosing implementation option 1 or 2 have an established community vision and a context plan which maps the jurisdiction by one of the seven context areas addressed in the plan. Once a community has established a community vision and has adopted a context plan only then may the community download the Toolkit, tailor it to meet local needs, and adopt the resulting development code.

Why is a Plan Important?
A community-wide plan is the foundation for a shared vision and provides a singular voice for how your community will grow and develop. On a less philosophical level, the plan guides the calibration of the Toolkit so that the resulting development code can guide the implementation of the plan and the community’s shared vision for the future.

Why are Defined Context Areas Important?
The short answer is that they prevent the wrong type of development from occurring in the wrong areas while encouraging the right type of development in the right areas. The context areas serve as the categorization system for the rules in the Toolkit. They organize all elements of the built environment and include Natural, Rural, Estate, Suburban, Urban, Center, and Special.

Planning and Context Areas
Learn more about the importance of comprehensive planning and context areas.

The Draft Land Use Toolkit
Review the first version of the Land Use Toolkit.

The Online User Guide
Search the user guide by theme or stakeholder interest.

Additional Project Documents
View presentations, reports, handouts and other publications.