I was thinking the same thing. Expect places like Country Club Hills to figure out a way to do that.
With some quick Googling, Oakwood, Boylan Heights, Hayes Barton, Bloomsbury, Mordecai, and Cameron Park are already designated as such. Even so, don’t all of these places have at least some non-SFH homes in them already?
Wtih more Googling, I found this page that talks about historic overlay districts: Raleigh Historic Districts | Raleigh Historic Development Commission. Some of the aforementioned are on this list, while others aren’t, plus a few more are added.
I can just see the divide now with non-historic suburban districts seeing this as affecting their lives while ITB communities are protected. Frankly, they’d have a good argument.
Where my mother lives in North Ridge, already nearly every half acre+, older, corner lot home that goes for sale, turns into a tear-down replaced by 2, $800k+ homes on newly subdivided lots.
When I think of the missing middle imagery that’s provided by the city in the recent YouTube video, romantic images of charming walkable neighborhoods with a rich collection of scale appropriate housing comes to mind. However, I don’t think that the rollout of this zoning change in most parts of the city will play out that way. While I don’t expect developers to put townhouses sideways on a half acre lot in places like North Ridge, simply because there’s more to gain for them in building million dollar+ SFHs, I can imagine that happening in more modest, middle class neighborhoods that were built in the 60s and 70s. However, this infill housing won’t make these neighborhoods the charming ,walkable neighborhoods of our imagination. While the zoning changes won’t require additional parking, we all know that parking will be provided because most of these places are neither walkable nor have reliable/available public transit.
On the flip side, I can imagine successful implementation of this rezoning in places where our suburban neighborhoods meet their neighborhood commercial districts. In my mind, I am thinking about places like the SFHs that abut places like Quail Corners Shopping Center, or the oft mentioned houses that back up onto St. Albans @ North Hills East. Used effectively, this planning tool allows us to create walksheds among the various mature suburban retail centers. Here are some example places where I can see this really improving the walkshed around a neighborhood center:
Google Maps
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^All 3 around Quail Corners
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^This has already transitioned to commercial from SFH just north of Falls Village, but I can imagine it incorporating more lots behind it into a significant amount of missing middle housing.
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^This area around Lafayette Village
I can also imagine that folks who own sizable SFH properties that became less desirable over the years as traffic near them increased, will look long and hard at developing their own properties as a way to maximize value. One place that comes to my mind is the corner of Lynn and Lead Mine Rds. There are some houses on large lots that right at that busy intersection and are not an ideal location for a SFH to most of the market.
Google Maps
Raleigh is a bit ahead of the curve, with a text change that would allow townhouses & duplexes in many more areas (though subject to lot size limits)
City Council Agenda for Tuesday April 6 includes rezoning E. Morgan St . / Person St. area for 40 stories .
^This is very easy to imagine going into formerly single family neighborhoods if single family zoning is eliminated. I can’t imagine anyone having much heartburn over something like this. In fact, it’s very easy to imagine grandma living nearby in a flat like this to be near her child and grandkids.
^another informational video that bolster’s Raleigh’s need to continue densifying its core and various nodes around the city. Thankfully Raleigh’s not 300 square miles and on the hook for that much infrastructure.
Interesting video from City Beautiful
Thanks for sharing. I used to live in Houston (many years ago), and I didn’t have the sense that their no-zoning strategy was working. I would occasionally see things next door to each other that made no sense to me whatsoever. However, and like I said, it was many years ago; maybe it’s better now?
This was and is a great idea, so it pains me to report that the bill wasn’t passed by either house of the legislature before what’s known as “crossover deadline,” which means that it is probably dead for this year. That’s a real shame. A lot of times when bills don’t get passed despite having a decent base of support, the problem isn’t necessarily that there was any strong opposition, it’s just that it wasn’t a high priority for leadership in either chamber. There’s so much that legislators are trying to get done in a very short amount of time, so the stuff that gets done is the stuff that the leadership really cares about getting passed.
Currently both chambers are controlled by Republicans, and party leadership really drives the agenda for what gets considered. I covered the legislature for years for the newspaper, and there were times when I would ask elected representatives what was going on with a certain bill, and it turned out I had more that I could tell the legislator than vice versa. I doubt that there are a lot of Republicans who are vehemently opposed to reducing regulations on home construction, but the leadership comes basically exclusively from places where building more missing middle housing is not really an issue or a priority.
That said, a lot of times legislation doesn’t get passed the first time it’s introduced, but it gets introduced at another session, or even another session, and support builds, and eventually it gets passed. I hope the sponsors come back with this again next time, with more sponsors, and keep pushing it for as long as it takes to get it enacted into law.
Dead for the rest of the year? Good grief it’s not even half way through the year. What do they do for the next 7 months?
They work on enacting the bills that cleared one or more house of the legislature before crossover deadline–of which there were a lot! The deadline is intended to make sure that more stuff gets done by spending the summer months focusing on the stuff that’s close to passage.
Also, North Carolina, like most states, has a part-time legislature. They’re supposed to be cleared out of there by August, although in the last decade legislative sessions have been lasting longer and longer.
There are also ways to get around the rule if you absolutely need to, but I wouldn’t hold out hope in this particular situation.
Just wanted to mention that the Text Change: TC-5-20 Missing middle Housing Options was recommended completely by the Planning Commission. One of the members mentioned that they felt this was being snuck in without community involvement. I really hope no one tries to step in and argue against it. I’m looking forward to this being passed by the City Council. I believe there will be a small discussion on June 1st and then a hearing on July 6th.
If it’s anything like the housing policy-related things we talk about on this site, I’m sure we’re fine 
It’ll be like area use plans for UDOs: it’ll be too obscure for anyone to care (even though this is the real tipping point for making dense developments prioritized).
Yeah, not against engagement at all but every now and then, if it’s a weedsy, technical planning thing, can the experts please just decide for me? Thanks! 
About 34 mins in, David Cox says he is against the middle household text change. Forget that guy. I want to know what he suggests in order to keep family home costs low.
Good replies from the other councilors. “I want to be clear because I know this will end up on a blog somewhere” ← good one from Melton
I wonder what blog that would be??
I was all ok with Melton’s comments. I wish he wouldn’t have retracted his statement lol. I think he only did it because of Cox’s comments. I also like council member Branch’s comments where he states that Poole Rd. has duplexes and you can’t really tell. I’m confident that a majority of citizens would be ok with duplexes and that it’s the vocal minority who really don’t like it.
Confuses me when people against Duplexes but not Townhomes. Just goes to show that it’s not the development that people don’t like, it’s the “type of people” that would live in a duplex in their minds.
You hit the nail on the head, IMO.