Durham’s New UDO: Supporting Small-Scale Affordable Housing
Why don’t we build more affordable housing in our small-scale residential zones?
Durham is in the process of rewriting its entire UDO, the rules that govern zoning in our city. This post is part of a series examining specific aspects of the proposed code and how we can make small changes that have meaningful positive impacts in the real world.
Other Posts in the Series:
How We Encourage Sprawl Without Meaning To (Coming Soon)
Small Details Have Big Impacts (Coming Soon)
We have a severe, inequitable mismatch in Durham. The vast majority (over 90%) of new affordable housing units are built in large apartment complexes (often using LIHTC tax credit funding). Meanwhile, the vast majority (over 90%) of residentially zoned land does not allow those apartment complexes.
Our current policies are speaking loud and clear to our vulnerable citizens: you are not welcome in 90% of our communities.
If that doesn’t make you angry, I don’t know what will. We need to open our communities and find ways to incentivize lower-cost housing, not only in dense high-rises or new sprawling subdivisions, but within our existing neighborhoods.
The proposed UDO draft in its current form tries to do that with “R-D, Option 3”. The problem? It doesn’t scale to small infill developments. There is debate around the percentage of units that need to be affordable to allow “Option 3”. Should it be 15%? Should it be 10%? That is fine if a large developer is building 200 units, but on small infill sites, 15% of 4 units is not even one full unit. It doesn’t help the vast majority of residential land that is currently zoned for one or two-family houses.
The UDO can’t solve this problem on its own. Construction costs are too high to build new housing for those earning 30% of Area Median Income without subsidy, for instance. Solutions outside of the UDO are needed to help Durham’s most vulnerable residents. That doesn’t mean the UDO can’t move the needle towards more affordability. It can. The UDO has the ability to create more affordability for some, even if it doesn’t solve for all. It can bring incremental progress.
The UDO should create “affordability by design”. Small units are cheaper to build and a less expensive product. Durham has a ton of 800 sf, one-story houses that were built in the early 1900s. These are starter homes for many residents of Durham but are not built very often today, and there is a limited supply remaining. The UDO can change that by allowing small projects (under 20 units) to use R-D, Option 3 zoning if units are a maximum of 800 sf. Let’s reintroduce starter homes in Durham and increase the number of people who can afford to buy a house here.
Additionally, the provisions in R-D, Option 3 are not strong enough. Anyone who has designed a site for multiple units with surface parking, quickly realizes that parking dominates what is possible. You can get creative on the living space. You can adjust where you put stairs, how you shape rooms, and how large you make rooms and overall units. Parking is tougher. Not only do you need a 9-foot x 18-foot space, but you also need the driveway. You need 24 feet behind the parking space for backing up. Ultimately, you need a ton of impervious surface that is not being used to house anyone.
Eliminating parking requirements has helped tremendously, but we live in a city where some parking is still necessary. The proposed UDO has requirements on where you can provide parking, which, when you do provide parking, actually leads to increased amounts of impervious surface and more space dedicated to cars. We will discuss that part of the UDO later, but at the very least, waive those restrictions for projects using R-D, Option 3 and creating affordable units in Durham.
Finally, it would take coordination outside the scope of the UDO rewrite, but one of the biggest expenses in the hands of the city are water and sewer tap fees. Currently, connecting a house to the water and sewer system costs almost $21,000. That’s not for the plumbing in the house. That’s not even for the plumbing in the ground on your site. That is simply the connection in the Right-of-Way. If we want to create starter homes, we can’t charge 10% of the cost to build the house1, solely for these connections.
Durham should create a fund. Any time a conforming R-D, Option 3 unit is proposed, the fund will cover that unit’s tap fees.
It will take much more work to create the affordable housing Durham needs, but we need to keep moving in the right direction.
CALL TO ACTION: There is a virtual input session TONIGHT (Tuesday June 3rd) from 6-7PM with UDO Project Consultants Code Studio. Details at Engage Durham. Zoom Registration link here.
Dave Olverson is an incremental developer and zoning advocate in Durham, NC. He has an econ undergrad degree from Duke and a planning degree from the University of North Carolina. In 2021, he got his GC license and works specifically on infill projects in Durham.
10% is a rough estimate of the construction costs only. It does not include the house design, engineering, or cost of the land, all which contribute significantly to the cost of building a house.