Minneapolis Missing Middle: Zoning Reform & Development Innovation

Supporting missing-middle development is a goal in many communities, however, such projects often remain elusive. This workshop will visit six recently constructed missing-middle projects and meet with project teams to discuss challenges and solutions in developing missing middle housing.

Minneapolis 2040, the City's comprehensive plan, took effect on January 1, 2020. Among the core policies of the plan is the support of housing growth throughout the city in order to improve housing choice and affordability. Since the plan's adoption, the City has pursued significant zoning reform to reduce barriers to neighborhood infill development at the missing-middle scale. While challenges and barriers remain, zoning reform coupled with innovation by architects and builders has led to an increase in missing-middle development in the city.

This workshop will visit six missing-middle infill projects and include discussions with planners, architects, and developers about reforms and innovations that made each project possible, along with challenges and barriers that remain. Each project is a successful example of housing development at the neighborhood scale on single-lot infill sites. Each project also has its own unique goals and challenges, including working in a historic district, creating deeply affordable units for families with children, pioneering innovative modular construction techniques, achieving passive house certification, and bringing ground floor commercial space to the missing middle.

This tour will be by bike, allowing participants to experience the neighborhood setting of each project at a human scale. This session will highlight how targeted regulatory reforms, together with creative design, can overcome barriers to missing-middle neighborhood infill. The session will also examine the limits of zoning reform and barriers largely outside the control of planners.