Section 163.3184, Florida Statutes, requires local governments to evaluate and propose amendments to their Comprehensive Plans every seven (7) years through a process known as the Evaluation and Appraisal Review (EAR).
The City of Miami Beach recently completed its EAR and has proposed several significant amendments to its Comprehensive Plan.
We have summarized the major proposed changes to the Miami Beach Comprehensive Plan that we believe will likely impact development in the City.
This update is only meant to be a brief summary of the most relevant changes. A detailed memorandum that summarizes the proposed Comprehensive Plan amendments is available upon request.
Resilient Land Use Element
- The Future Land Use Map (FLUM) will no longer contain a Parking (P) designation. Properties formerly designated as Parking will be designated as Public Facilities (PF) on the City’s FLUM.
- The permitted Floor Area Ratio (FAR) of the (PF) land use designation will be increased to 3.5 FAR. This is the only increase to permitted densities and intensities of future land use categories.
- The maximum density of an underlying future land use category may be increased by up to 80% for developments that incorporate workforce or affordable housing units, but the additional density can only be used for workforce or affordable housing units.
- For hurricane evacuation purposes, the City will not approve FLUM amendments or rezonings that increase density, except to foster workforce or affordable housing development.
- The Limited Mixed Use Residential Performance Standard (RM-PS-1) and Allison Island Low Density Planned Residential (RM-PRD-2) categories were added to the future land use categories. These categories were not described in the Comprehensive Plan text. The RM-PS-1 category permits 102 units per acre and 1.50 FAR, and the RM-PRD-2 category permits 25 units per acre and 1.45 FAR.
Transportation Element
- The City will now replace transportation concurrency management fees with a Mobility Fee, to encourage multi-modal transportation improvements, rather than traditional road expansion projects. The formula for calculating the Mobility Fee will be included in the Land Development Regulations.
- Development approvals for projects located along main thoroughfares within existing transit routes will be conditioned on dedication of an easement to the City or Miami-Dade Transit for public transit. Certain development projects may be eligible for fair share contributions.
- Establish Pedestrian Priority Zones in which new development will be required to abide by specific design criteria intended to encourage pedestrianism.
- The City is exploring replacing Commercial Loading Zones with Freight Loading Zones (FLZs), and place certain procedural and timing limitations on FLZs.
- The City contemplates overall reduction of on-site parking requirements in the Land Development Regulations in order to increase alternative transportation modes. New parking garages must be designed to permit conversion to other uses if future parking demand declines.
Climate Resiliency and Sustainability Element
- This entirely new element replaces the Conservation/Coastal Zone Management Element. Although many of the policies in the element are from the Coastal Zone Management Element, some of the new policies indicate the City’s intent to “restrict development activities to prevent damage to coastal resources, protect human life and limit public expenditures in areas subject to destruction by natural disasters…”
- Prohibited and Controlled trees are now those identified in the Miami-Dade County Landscape Manual.
Remaining Elements
Historic Preservation Element:
Neighborhood Conservation Districts will be a tool to balance historic preservation and adaptation for climate change.
Infrastructure Element:
The City intends to plan and provide infrastructure to serve redevelopment activities, including infill projects, as directed by the City Commission. In addition, first floor habitable spaces for commercial uses must be elevated or utilize flood proofing techniques and have sufficient height clearance to permit elevation of first floor habitable spaces in the future.
Capital Improvements Element:
The City intends to establish a procedure for grandfathering projects approved prior to the adoption of Mobility Fees. Otherwise no new development will occur unless the applicable Mobility Fees and public facilities necessitated by the project will be in place concurrent with the impacts of the project, as calculated by the formulas in the Land Development Regulations.
The City Commission adopted these amendments
October 16, 2019.
Click on map below and scroll to bottom of the page, then click on
EAR Amendments Exhibit A and go to page 185 to see the map in more detail.
