Small Lots, Smart Designs
The Challenge
The Small Lots, Smart Designs: Los Angeles Small Lot Subdivision Design Competition challenged the community of professional and student architects, designers, and planners, to innovate and create design solutions for the purpose of developing a catalogue of design templates for infill lots in the City of Los Angeles.
These designs reflect parcel subdivision possibilities for such lots found throughout established neighborhoods. The architect with the Grand Prize design will be commissioned to build his/her design on a lot owned by the Enterprise Home Ownership Partners.
Small Lots, Smart Designs generates a free catalogue of expedited design templates (indicating pre-approved parcel map configurations) that will be made available to developers and homeowners.
Select designs may be plan-checked and developed into a set of “off the shelf” standard plans that could be used on typical small lot subdivisions throughout the City and made available, for a fee, to builders and developers seeking well-designed and expedited designs.
Competition Administrators: Enterprise Home Ownership Partners
Overview
Los Angeles, California has witnessed a tremendous population growth in recent years, leaving the city with a housing shortage that has left many residents scrambling in an expensive and highly competitive real estate market. In this market of high housing demand and low supply, residents of the region are experiencing the realities that accompany the shortfall that exists in meeting these needs. New ideas that streamline regulatory processes involved in the development of more housing are however, beginning to open up the supply bottleneck.
- Building Healthy Communiies, APrimer for Growth and Development for L.A. Neighborhoods
The Response: The Small Lot Subdivision Ordinance
In trying to meet the need for housing, the City of Los Angeles adopted the Small Lot Subdivision Ordinance #176354 that provides an entirely new housing option: allowing individuals or developers to purchase a lot zoned for commercial or multi-family residential use and subdivide into much smaller lots than previously required with no setback requirement between the subdivided lots.
This new zoning ordinance presents an exciting opportunity for the community of planners, architects, and developers in the City of Los Angeles:
The elimination of setback requirements frees builders and developers to create more units on a parcel of land, without having to apply for variances.
The Small Lot Subdivision Ordinance allows the the creation of fee simple parcels without having to establish a condominium homeowners association. The ordinance eliminates the need for multiple variances, which can stall a development project; It facilitates the building of units in existing neighborhoods, which are closer to job centers. The Small Lot Subdivision Ordinance is a powerful tool that the City of Los Angeles has offered so that infill development is more feasible and more attractive.
- Los Angeles Plannning Department Recommendation Report: the planning commitment that led to the Ordinance.
The Competition: Small Lots, Smart Designs
In evaluating the effective use of this new tool, an ad hoc committee comprised of members from the Mayor’s Office, Enterprise Community Partners, the Departments of Planning, Housing, and Building and Safety, as well at the Community Redevelopment Agency, conducted case studies exploring the Ordinance’s applicability on sample lots. Architects and planners were invited to create a catalog of design templates for infill lots in the City of Los Angeles. These templates would represent plan-checked designs that are ready to be built by developers or individuals.
