How To Use The Future Land Use Planning Map
The updated Future Land Use Planning Map (FLUPM) is at this website:
This map is actually two maps—one for Future Land Use Planning, and one for Road Types. When you land on the page, hit the "Learn More" button in the top and middle boxes on the left. Those will each open new "explainer" pages, and if you bring your cursor toward the bottom of your screen on each page, you should be able to download these "explainer" sheets.
It's not an issue to have both Land Use Planning and Road Types up at once, which is the default when you land on the page. However, you can choose one or the other by going to the middle small box on the upper right that looks like a stack of paper and then by clicking on the options under "Layer," you can toggle between the maps or turn both on or off. The "Legend" option is just a repeat of what's already there on the left side of the map (as far as I can tell).
Fortunately, the city listened to the citizens and where the Future Land Use Planning colors once included recommended styles of housing, that has been removed from this map (and from 3.0 entirely) where such specifics do not belong; that's all in zoning now.
To find how your neighborhood is being planned, go to the search icon on the upper right corner (magnifying glass), enter your address and hit return. The map zooms you into that address. You'll see a small circle that indicates that address, and it will be in a particular color. The legend tells you the name of that color, and then you have to go to the "explainer" that you downloaded (or have left open in another tab) and you can see the city's general plan for that color.
On the Land Use explainer, pages 3 and 4 are about neighborhoods, and what's most striking is how "Low Intensity Residential" (which applies to East Memphis) reads like a description of Midtown, and "Anchor N'hd" (much of Midtown) reads like out east. When looking for infill, one needs available area, and the eastern lots are so much larger than midtown's, and the minimum lot size requirement is often less than half of an East Memphis lot, and out east they're tearing down houses all the time while Midtown is generally preserving them. It's kind of crazy how backward DPD is seeing it.
In part, that's because DPD is refusing to acknowledge that Midtown was built as suburbs and, with very few exceptions, continues to behave as suburbs—meaning most Midtowners drive to get where they're going. Case in point: During the recent snowstorm, Bari on Cooper was hit with a dining room full of customers that they didn't recognize. Why? Because of the snow, neighbors walked there and those neighbors had never patronized the place before. (But one visit does not a habit break.)
So make what you can of the FLUPM explainer, but with the housing specifics booted from here, the practical effect on your neighborhood will be much more from zoning than the FLUPM.
Where "road types" once also added density, that has been moved to zoning where it belongs. We've asked for more info about this explainer. For example, on the Transit row under Thoroughfares, what does "regional" mean? It's doubtful it means Jackson, TN or something like that, but then how does that differ from "Local"? I've not figured out the practical effect of this map and explainer.
You can give DPD your comments two ways, and we encourage you to do both—one by email and one on this map. So in the third box on the left, after you click "different land use is more important," if you'd like to note that your neighborhood, despite its proximity to commercial development, is actually a driving neighborhood and so the "anchor neighborhood" designation is incorrect and should be replaced by "low intensity residential," this is the place to make that point.
Please also help by sending an email with your comments to zoning@Memphistn.gov, and copy these two emails: president@midtownmemphis.org and philip.spinosa@memphistn.gov Please include your name and address.
Thank you.
