About Form-Based Codes
A Form-Based Code (FBC) is a means of regulating development to achieve a specific urban form. Form-based codes create a predictable public realm by controlling physical form primarily through city or county regulations with a lesser focus on land use.
Form-based codes are a new response to the modern challenges of urban sprawl, deterioration of historic neighborhoods, and neglect of pedestrian safety in new development. Tradition has declined as a guide to development patterns and the widespread adoption by cities of single-use zoning regulations has discouraged compact, walkable developments.
Form-based codes are a tool to address these deficiencies, and to provide local governments the regulatory means to achieve development objectives with greater certainty. View an example of
Euclidean Zoning Versus Form-Based Codes (PDF).
For More Information
For more information on what a FBC is, visit the
Form-Based Codes Institute website.