Massachusetts Smart Growth Alliance

The Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development will partner with municipalities that have identified one or more areas within their communities as being appropriate locations for significant new growth, whether commercial, residential or mixed-use. Elligible areas must be located in places with existing infrastructure, access to transportation and not be located on environmentally sensitive land.

What constitutes significant new growth will vary among communities and regions, but in all cases the community must be committed to planning ahead not just for identified new construction that is ready to break ground in the short term, but more broadly for future development within the growth district over an extended period (five, ten or twenty years).

EOHED will, in partnership with regional planning agencies and local communities, identify promising growth districts on an on-going basis and thereafter work closely with the local communities to make (or keep) the districts development ready. Obviously, not all new development in the Commonwealth will occur within these growth districts, but the development that does occur within these districts does have the potential to shape the overall patterns of our state’s growth in the coming years.

Locations targeted for EOHED assistance as “growth districts” will have the following fundamental characteristics:

Pre-Planned Zoning and Streamlined Permitting.  The municipality will plan and zone the district for appropriate development in advance, as well as modify subdivision and other land use regulations and procedures, so as to consistently permit projects within six months.  Permit applicants will be able to coordinate their local applications through a single point of contact at the municipality.

Market-Based Planning.  The municipality will plan and zone the district for uses and densities for which there is reasonable market demand. The zoning will not be limited to a narrow set of uses for which market demand may fluctuate.

Fairness to Neighbors.  Contemplated uses and densities will reasonably take into account and mitigate possible impacts on neighboring communities, on adjacent neighborhoods within the same community, and where applicable, on those who may be displaced by the new development.

Focused and Environmentally Sensitive Land Use. To the extent new development will be located on previously undisturbed land, it will be sited to avoid environmentally significant areas and designed to preserve open spaces.

Transportation Access.  Contemplated uses and densities will be supported by existing transportation infrastructure or by reasonable identifiable upgrades to that infrastructure.

Adequate Utilities.  Contemplated uses and densities will be supported by existing water, sewer and other utility infrastructure or by reasonable identifiable upgrades to that infrastructure.