Buffalo has a rich legacy of planning, starting with Joseph Ellicott’s 1804 radial and grid street plan and Frederick Law Olmsted’s park and parkway system. The Buffalo Green Code benefits from a recent history of award-winning plans, studies, and guiding documents that collectively express the community’s vision for the future. The new zoning code will not attempt to “re-plan” the city, but will focus primarily on implementation.
In fact, Buffalo’s Comprehensive Plan makes clear a new, “green” zoning code is the Plan’s principal vehicle for implementation:
“The Comprehensive Plan also needs a revised zoning ordinance. As such, it can provide the measure of predictability and certainty that both investors and citizens require. Without a companion zoning ordinance the Comprehensive Plan will lack the enforceability that will make it credible and achievable.” - Buffalo’s Comprehensive Plan, Page 58
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Buffalo’s Future Land Use Plan: 2012/32 (PDF 34MB)
Technical Appendix 1: Mapping Analysis (PDF 36MB)
Technical Appendix 2: Place-Based Planning Handbook (PDF 30MB)
Submit comments about the draft plan here.
Buffalo’s Comprehensive Plan and the planning documents it incorporates by reference are the basis for Mayor Bryon W. Brown’s green code initiative. You can download these plans here:
Queen City in the 21st Century: Buffalo’s Comprehensive Plan (2006)
Queen City Hub Plan: A Regional Action Plan for Downtown Buffalo, Volume 1, Overview (2003)
Queen City Hub Plan: A Regional Action Plan for Downtown Buffalo, Volume 2, The Work Plan (2003)
The Olmsted City - The Buffalo Olmsted Park System: Plan for the 21st Century (2008)
The Buffalo Green Code is also informed by the smart growth objectives of the regional plan, Erie-Niagara Framework for Regional Growth (2006).
Buffalo’s existing zoning code, last updated in 1951, can be downloaded here.