Panama City Neighborhood Plans Meetings in July & August 2024

What's the future of Glenwood, Millville and St. Andrews? The Neighborhood Plans describe a vision for complete NEIGHBORHOODS, great STREETS, & resilient OPEN SPACES/INFRASTRUCTURE. To allow these things to occur, the zoning text changes were unanimously approved in 2021. Now there's just one final step to make this vision a reality: Map Adoption.

Join us for a community-wide meeting July 15th and individual Neighborhood Meetings, August 5^th and 6^th to share your input.

Community-wide meeting details. Millville neighborhood meeting. Glenwood neighborhood meeting. St. Andrews neighborhood meeting.

PANAMA CITY NEIGHBORHOOD PLANS -ZONING UPDATES

STEP 1: Strategic Vision & Neighborhood Plans (2019 - 2021)

As part of the Long-Term Recovery Planning Project in response to Hurricane Michael, the Strategic Vision for Downtown and its Waterfront was created to direct rebuilding and future growth while also preserving the city's history and strong sense of community. In 2020, the City expanded the visioning process to plan for the Glenwood, Millville, and St. Andrews neighborhoods. Virtual and in-person meetings throughout the year provided opportunities for hundreds of community participants to help create a shared vision.

The vision for each neighborhood includes lively mixed-use neighborhood centers, more housing opportunities, walkable streets and greater connectivity, and resilient open spaces and infrastructure, as well as programs and policies to support residents, small business owners and entrepreneurs. The Neighborhood Plans were approved by City Commission in March / April 2021.

STEP 2A: Zoning District Text Update (2021)

Following adoption of the Neighborhood Plans in 2021, a critical next step was to revise City codes to fit the vision and encourage implementation. Revisions include removing existing zoning requirements that prohibit development as illustrated in the plan and introducing additional standards to give more predictability to the form of future development. Three new neighborhood zoning districts were proposed for Glenwood, Millville and St. Andrews: Neighborhood Downtown, Neighborhood General, and Neighborhood Residential. A draft of the proposed zoning updates, including these new districts devised specifically to match each neighborhood vision was included in the final plan report as Appendix A. The neighborhood zoning district text was approved by City Commission in 2021.

STEP 2B: Zoning District Map Approval (present)

Now the City is taking the next step, to initiate the adoption of the neighborhood zoning district map for Glenwood, Millville and Downtown. The maps were created with community input during the neighborhood planning in 2020-2021. The City will hold additional meetings in upcoming months to review the draft zoning maps and gather additional community input. The benefit of adopting the map is that it applies the recently approved zoning districts to the parcels and neighborhoods they were intended. This will enable the shared vision of walkable mixed-use centers, quality housing for existing and new residents, and resilient neighborhoods to be realized in Glenwood, Millville and St. Andrews.

For more details see Neighborhood Plans Report pages 4.58, 5.42, 6.42 and Appendix A: rebuildpc.org/panama-city-neighborhood-plans

BENEFITS OF ADOPTING THE ZONING UPDATES:

• Replace general commercial zoning on corridors. The General Commercial zoning that lines most corridors across the city today prohibits residential development. Lack of demand to fill all of these corridors with commercial development results in vacant buildings and lots, and lack of activity. To encourage revitalization, a mix of uses (including residential) will be permitted on Glenwood, Millville and St. Andrew's corridors under the new zoning.
• Revise building setbacks, add parking setbacks. The placement of buildings and parking directly relates to the walkability of a place. Buildings with active uses lining sidewalks encourage pedestrian activity, essential to a traditional business district. The existing downtown district zoning for Millville and St. Andrews has no front building setback; this allows buildings to be built up to the sidewalk, but also would permit buildings to be set back behind parking lots. In addition, the same General Commercial standards with large setbacks that shaped development along the auto-oriented 23rd Street corridor applies to corridors in the historic neighborhoods. In the Neighborhood Districts, a maximum building setback gives more predictability to the location of future buildings. A new parking setback is also introduced to ensure that parking is separated from sidewalks by buildings or landscape areas.
• Adjust parking ratios. Oversized parking requirements discourage reuse of historic buildings, restrict small business development, and reduce housing affordability. In addition, too much parking sterilizes what should be an active public realm. Minimum parking requirements in Panama City are currently one-size-fits-all; a new standard for walkable, traditional neighborhood areas is established in the Neighborhood Downtown and General districts. The new zoning reduces the minimum requirement and introduces a maximum and allows development applications that meet all of the requirements of the district (such as building placement and design) to be exempt from minimum parking requirements.
• Allow and encourage "missing middle" housing types. The neighborhood vision anticipates a variety of housing types to support existing residents to remain while also attracting new households of a variety of ages and income levels. Forms of "Missing Middle" housing such as duplex, triplex and cottage courts can fit well within historic neighborhood settings. However, current standards such as minimum lot width and size, and large front yard setbacks are inconsistent with some existing homes and discourage these types in the neighborhood's various residential districts. The Neighborhood Districts regulate primarily by building design (building height, setback and massing) rather than number of units per lot to allow and encourage more variety in housing that fits with the scale of surrounding development.
• Add building design standards for walkability. Additional building design standards are included for the Neighborhood Downtown and General areas to give guidance to developers and assurance to property owners that future buildings on surrounding parcels will contribute to the public realm and be consistent with the vision. Such provisions include requirements for minimum fenestration (doors and windows) on building facades to prohibit blank walls, building design standards that use basic proportions and detailing to relate to the scale of a pedestrian, and a list of permitted building wall materials to ensure durability.

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