Introduction: The Debate on Design Review

Design review is a procedure, like zoning, used by cities and towns to control the aesthetics and design of development projects. Although it is a new phenomena, its adoption by local jurisdictions is growing at a rate that compares to the rapid adoption of zoning in the 1930s. I have recently completed a national survey of planning agencies in more than 370 cities and towns on the topic of their design review processes; 83 percent of the towns surveyed had some form of design review. My initial assumption—that aesthetic review was primarily restricted to historic districts and structures—proved to be wrong. Only twelve respondents reserved design review exclusively for historic structures or districts. Therefore, we can conclude that more than 85 percent of the cities and towns in this country have moved into the arena of design review of ordinary, nonhistoric development projects. This widespread use of design review is also new: 60 percent of the respondents with design review have introduced it in the last twelve years, 10 percent in the last two years.