Office of Planning and Grants - Urban Initiatives

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Urban Initiatives

Urban Initiatives is responsible for managing the Growth Policy requirements for the City and for managing the legislative initiatives of the City Council and Administration as they relate to that policy. It is also responsible for comprehensive neighborhood and area-based planning activities in the Missoula Urban area. Responsibilities include activities related to growth management initiatives, land use and community development planning, evaluation of development proposals for compliance with existing comprehensive plans and policies, comprehensive plan amendments and plan implementation initiatives. Resource management responsibilities include providing demographic, socioeconomic, and environmental resource data, and technical assistance on comprehensive planning elements such as housing, capital improvements, open space, neighborhood planning, and natural and cultural resources conservation.

Index of Current Projects and Activities

Title 20 Amendments Updated 5/11/10

In October of 2007, the City Council approved a rewrite of the City's zoning regulations. This involved restructuring the document, combining regulations into common chapter, eliminating redundant regulations, renaming districts, consolidating uses, expanding definitions, and occasionally renaming zoning terms. After the extensive review and rewrite, some follow-up and corrections are to be expected. This is the first draft of suggested revisions. They are based on OPG having questions fielded during the past five months, technical advice from those that use the document, and the fact that some regulations from Title 19 were inadvertently removed or changed in Title 20.

The document below describes the framework of a referral to the Plat, Annexation and Zoning (PAZ) Committee, which will be forwarded in May, 2010. The table consists of section references, a brief description of each issue and suggested revisions. With City Council's agreement, staff will take the revisions through the process of Planning Board review and recommendations and City Council final review, recommendations, and approval.

Early draft suggested revisions to Title 20 - dated 3-26-10

City Council forwarded the 2010 proposed maintenance amendments to Planning Board for consideration at its June 1, 2010 meeting.

Urban Fringe Development Area (UFDA) Updated 04/26/10

UFDA Project 2009 Yearbook
The 2009 Yearbook is the second annual update of the supporting data used to create the UFDA Growth Policy Amendment, adopted in 2008 by the Missoula City Council and the Board of County Commissioners. The Yearbook tells the story of calendar year 2009 by documenting new residential development and infrastructure growth and their cumulative impacts to the resources within the Missoula Urban Services Area (URSA). The Yearbook contains many facts and figures, but still poses more questions than it answers.

On-line version (2.4 mb)
Print version (29 mb)

The original UFDA data and documentation can also be viewed from this webpage.

Growth Policy Amendment

The purpose of the Urban Fringe Development Area project is to provide governing bodies with information for addressing growth in the Urban Fringe Area within a regional context. The goal is to identify where growth is mostly to occur within the Urban Fringe Area and develop implementation strategies for addressing growth in accordance with adopted policy within growth areas.

The Urban Fringe is described as the area inside the Urban Service Area, with an emphasis on addressing growth in the area between the City limits and the Urban Service Area boundary. The URSA is the same as the City of Missoula Wastewater Sewer Service Area.

One result of this project was the creation of an UFDA Amendment to the Missoula County Growth Policy. The Amendment was adopted November 24, 2008 by the Missoula City Council and December 23, 2008 by the Missoula Board of County Commissioners.

Growth Policy Amendment Text (City) (County)
Growth Policy Amendment Map
UFDA Presentation at the October 1, 2008 PAZ meeting
Staff recommended change - October 1, 2008

Planning Board Recommendations: On September 23, 2008, the Planning Board recommended by a vote of 8-0 that the proposed draft of the Urban Fringe Development Area Project - 2008 Amendment be approved as shown in Attachment A1 as an amendment to the Missoula County Growth Policy and further recommended that Scenario E be created and included as part of this project and that Scenario E represent a scenario where wildlife habitat, sensitive lands and prime soils and open space, which are the three of the eight layers that seem to be landscaped-based immutable, be prioritized. A suitability analysis (map) shows the weighted landscape based model.

UFDA Staff Presentation given at September 16, 2008 Planning Board

Background

The initial phase of the project has been to collect data and discuss issues and solutions with City, County and other key agencies. in a series of three working group meetings, the group focused on public, safety, infrastructure, parks, open space, and pubic health. This phase culminated with a presentation to the governing bodies on January 16, 2008 and the Urban Fringe Development Area Project document. It contains a series of maps, key points, and discussion items and can be viewed or downloaded here.

An update was presented to the governing bodies on May 7, 2008. In the update, three scenarios were shown (see Scenarios map below).

Report from the UFDA Open Houses May 21 and May 22 - The Urban Initiatives staff held four Open Houses asking Missoulians to review resource maps and comment on three growth scenarios for Missoula. Ninety-eight citizens attended. Staff have compiled these comments and have the material available online for comment by clicking on any of the following links:

Suitability Analysis and Staff Recommendation

To continue the scenario process, staff created a GIS (Geographic Information System) suitability analysis of lands inside the Urban Services Area. Eight criteria were used to assess the advantages of and challenges to residential development within fourteen neighborhoods in the URSA. Criteria included access/proximity to:

Mountain Water
City Sewer
Roads
Existing Transit and Bike Routes
City Fire Travel Response Time
Prime Soils and Open Space
Sensitive Lands
Key Wildlife Habitat

Each criterion has its own map, which can be accessed by following this link (5.15 mb). Subsequently, staff created a final suitability map by stacking all criteria on top of each other to create an overall suitability rating , where each of the eight criteria was equally weighted. The combined final analysis removed the constrained lands from consideration.

Staff prepared a fourth growth scenario (Scenario D: Staff Recommendation) (1.03 mb) to respond to the public comment and suitability analysis. A booklet (6.63 mb) containing the each neighborhood’s Business As Usual and Staff Recommendation growth scenarios and suitability advantages and challenges are displayed along with photos of existing Missoula scenes to show the potential character of development.

UFDA Calendar of Public Presentations and Discussions: (Updated 5/5/08) Most presentations are scheduled as an item on the group/organization's agenda and therefore other business will need to be conducted besides the UFDA presentation. Other organizations that staff are coordinating with include the remaining Neighborhood Councils, Orchard Homes Neighborhood Association, Service Clubs, Business Improvement District (BID), Five Valley Land Trust, Missoula County School Board, and the University of Montana Facilities Administration.

Public Outreach to Date - report on public outreach since the UFDA project began to now
UFDA Summary Score Cards from presentations - Evaluations of planning considerations provided from public comment collected during outreach meetings

UFDA and Working Group Map Series: (Tips for viewing maps)

Instructions for opening and using maps - Several Adobe Acrobat maps are available for downloading (see below). A high speed connection is suggested to download these maps. To download an of the maps listed below, right-click on the hyperlink and choose 'Save Target As.' Save the file to your computer. Select 'Adobe Acrobat Document' from the Save As Type drop-down. Once the download has completed, you can open the file in Adobe Acrobat.

List of Maps	Information Included on Map	Low Resolution	High Resolution
UFDA Project updated 7/30/08 (click on X under the resolution to view)	Contains snapshots and explanations of all maps of UFDA project as of July 30, 2008.	x	x (38.9 mb)
Landscape-based Suitability Analysis	Combined model with non-renewable resources	x
Suitability Analysis	Contains all the maps	x
Scenario D	Staff's recommendation	x
School District	School District information	x
Historic Resources	Historic Districts and other resources	x
Scenarios Comparison	Scenarios A, B, and C and the Entitled lots	x
Scenarios	Scenarios A, B and C compiled after the UFDA Open House	x
Density: Net Density Comparisons	Census Block Group Density: Gross Density, Net Density, and Unconstrained Lands Density	x
Density: Net Density to URSA Averages	Census Block Group Density: Net Density Comparison to URSA-wide Comp Plan and Zoning Averages	x
Density: Transit Supportive and Land Use - Zoning Analysis	Census Block Group Density: 1) Is the block group	x
Developable Land in URSA	"Developable" Land by zoning type in URSA	x
Public Safety Poster (printable)	City of Missoula Fire District, Rural Fire Districts, Stations, Service Areas, Critical Infrastructure Data	x
Public Safety Screen	City of Missoula Fire District, Rural Fire Districts, Stations, Service Areas, Critical Infrastructure Data	x
Public Works: Transportation	2025 Road Deficiencies, Mountain Line Bus Network, Non-motorized network, TIP Projects, Trans Issues (2004 T-PLAN)	x
Public Works: Water and Sanitation	Sewer Lines, Water Lines, Future Projects, Wells, PWS, School District Boundaries	x
POSPH: Soils and Agriculture	Soils of Agricultural Importance, Tax Assessed farmsites and ag land, Irrigation Ditches	x
POSPH: Parks and Open Spaces	Parks, Conservation Easements, Trails, Connections	x
POSPH: Natural Resources	Ungulate Winter Range, Important Birding Areas, Wildlife Hwy Linkage Zones, FEMA Floodplain, NWI	x
POSPH: Public Health	Contaminants: Septic Systems, Remediation Sites, Underground Storage Tanks . . . PM Boundaries, Geologic folds and faults	x
UFDA Project 11x17 booklet 1/16/08	Contains snapshots and explanations of all maps.	x	x (100 mb)
2008 Yearbook	Facts and figures updates since the adoption	x	x (28 mb)

If you have any trouble downloading these maps we can get a copy to you in one of the following ways:

Bring a flash drive and we will copy files onto it; or
Purchase a compact disc (CD) with the maps - cost will be $1.00 for the CD.

For more information or questions contact:

Laval Means - lmeans@co.missoula.mt.us or (406) 258-3797
Mike Barton - mbarton@co.missoula.mt.us or (406) 258-3874
Lewis YellowRobe - lyellowrobe@co.missoula.mt.us or (406) 258-4651
Casey Wilson - cwilson@co.missoula.mt.us or (406) 258-4708

Resources and Links

Neighborhood Sampler - a tour of sample sites within various neighborhoods in Missoula, Montana

Missoula Online Statistical System (MOSS)

Contact Information

Laval Means, Senior Planner - (406) 258-3797, lmeans@co.missoula.mt.us
Tom Zavitz, Planner II - (406) 258-4983, tzavitz@co.missoula.mt.us
Lewis YellowRobe, Planner II - (406) 258-4651, lyellowrobe@co.missoula.mt.us
Jen Gress, Planner I - (406) 258-4949, jgress@co.missoula.mt.us

Missoula County - Office of Planning and Grants