Tag Archives: Alex Lawson

Discriminating between renters and homeowners in zoning

Planning,

By Alex Lawson

When isn’t a house a home? When it’s occupied by renters, according to the City of Syracuse’s zoning code. In every other municipality in New York State, the single-unit houses, duplexes, townhouses, apartments, and condos where people live are considered to be ‘residential’ uses for the purposes of zoning regardless of when the families living in those housing units are tenants or owner occupants. That was true for more than 100 years in Syracuse too, but in 2024 City Hall amended its zoning code to claim that a house is only ‘residential’ if owner-occupied—all rented housing is now considered ‘residential-commercial.’

That would be a little gross but not too much of a problem if it were simply a matter of language, but City Hall’s distinction between renters and homeowners has practical implications. Read through the City of Syracuse zoning code, and you’ll find many instances where City Hall’s decision to discriminate between homeowners and tenants as a matter of zoning creates inconsistent and unfair outcomes.

Rented vs Owner-Occupied single- and two-unit dwellings

The City of Syracuse’s zoning code distinguishes physically identical residential structures as different use types based on whether or not the occupants own or rent the building. In the case of single- and two-unit dwellings, this distinction brings with it different zoning regulations, and it means that physically identical buildings could be owned but not rented depending on the size, location, and history of the structure. The distinction also creates the possibility of banning rental housing from entire zoning districts.

Owner-Occupied dwellings in multi-unit buildings.

The City of Syracuse’s zoning code does not allow owner-occupancy of dwellings in multi-unit buildings. Multi-unit dwellings are listed as a use under the Residential-Commercial use category, and that category only contains dwellings that are rented:

“Uses in this category comprise non-Owner Occupied residential occupancy of a Dwelling Unit. Tenancy is arranged on a month-to-month or longer basis and may include individually rented rooms or rental of the entire Dwelling Unit by a person or group of people for the purpose of residential occupancy.”

Owner-occupied dwellings are listed under the Residential Living use category, and there is no multi-unit use type in that category so it is not possible—as a matter of zoning—to own an individual unit within a multi-unit structure. This makes condominiums and cooperatives in buildings with more than three units—such as the condominiums above the Landmark Theater—impermissible uses in the City of Syracuse.

No owner-occupied Live/Work dwellings

For identical reasons to those described above, the City of Syracuse zoning code does not allow owner-occupancy of a Live/Work dwelling.

Missing Dimensional Requirements for new Residential-Commercial Uses

There are no lot width minimum or area minimum requirements for single-unit non-owner occupied, single-unit commercial conversion, two-unit non-owner occupied, or two-unit commercial conversion dwelling units anywhere in the ordinance as enacted.

This appears to be an oversight. When the City of Syracuse drafted the amended ordinance, they did not account for the fact that some existing dimensional requirements were use-specific and that newly created residential-commercial uses would not be subject to preexisting regulations.

Conflicting dimensional requirements for single-unit attached

The City of Syracuse zoning code was recently amended with the intention of reducing the minimum lot width required for attached single-unit dwellings in zones R1, R2, and R3 from 25’ to 20’. These lot width requirements are listed in two separate places—the subsections pertaining to each individual zone district and in the summary table of dimensional standards. The amended ordinance only changed the minimum lot width requirements for attached single-unit dwellings in the individual zone district descriptions, and it left the summary table untouched. As enacted, the code contains two different minimum lot width requirements for attached single-unit dwellings in zones R1, R2, and R3.

Renting two-unit non-owner occupied dwellings

The code does not allow the individual units in a two-unit dwelling to be rented separately unless the units have undergone ‘commercial conversion’ to add bedrooms to the original floorplan. The code’s definition of a two-unit non-owner occupied dwelling stipulates that the building must be rented in its entirety to a single tenant or tenant group:

“Dwelling, Two-Unit Non-Owner Occupied: the rental or leasing of a two unit dwelling in its entirety to a single tenant or tenant group for residential use.”

The definition of two-unit dwelling makes it clear that the term refers to the building itself and not to the individual units within it:

“Dwelling, Two-Unit: A single building containing two complete dwelling units.”

The definition of a two-unit commercial conversion is written differently and allows for the possibility that each unit might be rented separately, but even it contains language about all tenants sharing “common areas” including kitchens, living areas, bathrooms, and bedrooms that would not be shared by both units in a two-unit building.

The definition of two-unit commercial conversion also states that this use type also includes owner occupied single-unit dwellings when three or more of the bedrooms in the dwelling unit are rented separately. This is likely a typo as the exact same sentence appears in the definition of single-unit commercial conversions.

Attached/Detached distinction for Residential-Commercial Dwellings

The City of Syracuse zoning code divides owner-occupied single-unit dwellings into two different use types depending on whether the building is freestanding or attached to adjacent buildings via party walls. These two use types are referred to as attached and detached single-unit dwellings, respectively.

There is no similar distinction for rented single-unit dwellings. They are all classed as either non-owner-occupied or commercial conversion single-unit dwellings. If the distinction between attached and detached single-unit dwellings matters, then the code must make that distinction for residential-commercial use types. If the distinction does not matter, then there is no reason to make it for residential living use types.

This has practical implications. Interpreting rented single-unit dwellings to include both attached and detached buildings would mean that single-unit attached dwellings could be owned but not rented in zone districts MX4 and MX5. If, on the other hand, non-owner-occupied and commercial conversion single-unit dwellings are only detached, then it is impermissible as a matter of zoning to rent a townhouse.

Given all these problems, it’s worth asking why City Hall would choose to discriminate between renters and homeowners. The publicly stated reason is that this is necessary because they removed the old zoning code’s definition of ‘family.’ Before ReZone passed in 2023, the zoning code referred to ‘single-family’ and ‘multi-family’ dwellings, and it defined what a ‘family’ is in terms of both blood relations and household dynamics as a way to prohibit overcrowding in an individual house or apartment (no more than 1 family could live in a single-family dwelling). It was good to get rid of that definition because it’s not City Hall’s business to tell a household whether or not they’re really a family, but there was no reason to replace that bad piece of zoning with another discriminatory piece of zoning. NYS Building Codes already govern ‘overcrowding,’ and shoehorning that building code issue into the zoning code doesn’t add anything useful.

No other municipality in New York State discriminates between renters and homeowners as a matter of zoning. There is no good precedent for discriminating in this way, it doesn’t solve any problem, and it creates many new problems. City Hall should repeal the amendments that introduced this distinction to local zoning.

Zoning Reform: ADUs

Planning,

By Alex Lawson

One of ReZone’s most innovative changes was to make Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) legal in every residential zoning district. This (along with the legalization of townhomes) was the move that ‘ended’ exclusionary single-family zoning in Syracuse, because it meant that there were no longer any residential lots where a detached single-family house was the only type of housing allowed, and any residential lot could theoretically hold at least two housing units.

However, in the almost three years since ReZone made ADUs legal, only a handful have applied for building permits and none have actually been built. There are reasons for this beyond zoning, and the problem isn’t unique to Syracuse—plenty of places that legalized ADUs had to tweak their laws to actually get anything built—but if City Hall is actually committed to making ADUs part of the solution to our housing crisis, then the zoning code needs to change to make them easier to build.

OWNER OCCUPANCY REQUIREMENT

The biggest problem for ADUs in Syracuse is that the zoning code only allows them to be built or occupied if the owner of the property lives in either the ADU or the principal residence on the property. This kind of restriction is common in municipalities. because people don’t like rented housing, and they don’t like the idea of landlords building new rental housing in their neighborhoods.

This means that only homeowners can build ADUs, and each homeowner can only build one ADU. There are a couple of problems here. First, most homeowners aren’t developers or contractors, and they don’t have experience managing a construction project. This essentially means that only amateurs are allowed to build ADUs, so it’s not surprising that not many are getting built. 

The second issue with the owner-occupancy requirement is that it restricts financing for ADU construction. Banks aren’t keen to lend for the construction of a rental unit that they won’t be able to rent if the borrower defaults on the loan. This leaves home equity lines of credit as the only real option for financing ADU construction.

Finally, the owner-occupancy requirement makes ADUs less attractive investments for property owners themselves because the value of their investment in the property is dependent on the purchaser. A house with an ADU should be worth more than one without because it can generate rental income, but that’s only true if the property owner lives on the lot, so a bank might not recognize that additional value. This hurts resale value, and it is a disincentive for homeowners to build ADUs instead of putting their money somewhere it may get a better return, like the stock market or a kitchen remodel.

For all of these reasons, owner-occupancy requirements are widely considered to be a ‘poison pill’ for ADU laws, and experts agree that municipalities should eliminate them. In Syracuse, City hall should amend the zoning code to remove the ADU owner-occupancy requirement and allow ADUs to be built as accessories to any single-unit dwelling.

CONSISTENT RULES

Cost will always be a barrier to ADU construction, but consistent regulation can help by allowing specialization and economies of scale. When California adopted statewide design standards for ADUs, several companies responded by designing free-standing ADUs that could be mass-produced and installed in any qualifying lot in the state. Standardization and mass production offered a lower-cost option than forcing every property owner to hire an architect to create a bespoke one-off design for every ADU.

Syracuse isn’t the State of California, but the same principle can apply here: consistent rules for ADUs can allow local builders to design an ADU that can go in anybody’s backyard, and repeated construction can allow for bulk materials purchasing and specialization that can lower costs.

In order to unlock these lower costs, City Hall needs to amend its zoning ordinance to make rules for ADUs consistent between lots. One glaring issue is the new rule (adopted in 2025) that sets the maximum size of every ADU at 50% of the size of the primary dwelling. That means identical adjacent lots can have different standards for ADU design if the houses that sit on those lots are different. Another similarly problematic regulation is the one adopted in 2024 that requires detached ADUs to be decorated similarly to the primary dwelling. This, again, creates different standards for different ADUs based on the appearance of whatever house is already on the lot, and it can frustrate attempts to lower costs by streamlining ADU construction.

ALLOW ADUs ABOVE GARAGES

One of the best places to put an ADU is above a garage. This arrangement minimizes impermeable surface coverage and maximizes parking and yardspace while providing the additional privacy of a detached ADU. This arrangement is so popular that you can buy predrawn plans for garage/ADU combos on the internet.

However, several details in Syracuse’s zoning code makes this popular and practical ADU option functionally impossible to build.

The most glaring issue is the code’s 16’ height limit for accessory structures. It’s essentially impossible to build a two-story structure when the highest point of the roof cannot be more than 16’ above the ground. This plan for a garage/ADU combo, for instance, is 28’ tall.

The second problem has to do with restrictions on total square footage of all accessory structures. The zoning code limits ADUs to a maximum of 800 square feet of finished area (or 50% of the square footage of the primary dwelling, as previously discussed). That’s pretty generous, but the code also limits the total square footage of all accessory uses and structures to 1000 square feet. That means any ADU above a garage could be, at most, 500 square feet because the garage below has to be at least as large, and the 1000 square foot limit applies to the garage and ADU’s combined area. This area restriction would prohibit the construction of this garage/ADU combo, for instance, despite the fact that both the garage and ADU would be allowed on their own.

Restricting the total square footage of accessory structures in this way is nonsensical because it encourages people to build other designs with less favorable outcomes. A side-by-side 600 square foot ADU and 400 square foot garage, for instance, would be allowed under current rules, but that structure would cover an additional 400 square feet of the lot with an impermeable surface compared to a 600 square foot ADU stacked on top of a 600 square foot garage.

To fix these problems and make garage/ADU combos easier to build, the code should make two changes. First, eliminate the separate height limit for accessory structures and apply a single height limit to all structures in any zoning district. Second, eliminate square footage restrictions on accessory structures and allow the code’s maximum impermeable lot coverage requirements to regulate their total size.

ADUs are good. They create badly needed new housing options in existing neighborhoods. They allow homeowners to generate income from their biggest financial asset. They allow families to stay together even when they outgrow a single house. It is a good thing that ReZone made them legal in Syracuse. Now, City Hall needs to further amend the code to make ADUs not just legal, but practical so that more people can benefit from these types of homes.

Commemorating Cook’s Coffee House Riot

Community

By Alex Lawson

Syracuse should make a bigger deal out of January 1. That’s the date of the Cook’s Coffee House Riot—the delightfully weird event that birthed the City of Syracuse.

Before 1848, what we now call the City of Syracuse was a collection of independent villages. Syracuse—centered on Clinton Square—was the largest, but it was surrounded by Salina, Geddes, Lodi, and Onondaga Hollow. These little settlements jockeyed for primacy during the first fifty years or so of their existence by competing for the County Seat, the Erie Canal, the salt industry, and other markers of early American urbanism.

The Village of Syracuse’s greatest rival was Salina—the older settlement centered on Washington Square on today’s Northside. Salina was older than Syracuse and had been the earliest site of salt production, but Syracuse outgrew its northern neighbor after successfully routing the Erie Canal through Clinton Square and developing a new way to harvest local salt. Although both villages prospered through the first half of the nineteenth century, Syracuse was clearly on pace to become Onondaga County’s preeminent municipality.

Cook’s Coffee House was located on the southeast corner of Washington and Warren Streets—the current site of Key Bank. Cook’s was a local institution with a striking interior. From a Forest to a City describes the decoration:

“[The] bar was made very attractive by placing mirrors back of the numerous decanters of liquors, and to add to the attractions was a collection of birds, the cages being hung in such a manner that every movement of the inmates was reflected in the mirrors. Chief among these attractions was a parrot whose powers of speech were most remarkable… The parrot seemed to be well informed of bar room etiquette, and he would call in the most deliberate manner for different kinds of drinks; he was cunning and mischievous, but, unfortunately, a most profane bird, and when giving utterance to his profanity the harshness of his voice was most remarkable.”

Cook’s Coffee House Riot took place during a New Year’s Ball on January 1, 1844. Several “roughs” from Salina attended the ball with the intention of picking a fight with citizens of Syracuse. The brawl escalated quickly, several people were shot—all survived—and the Sheriff called out the local militia to break it up. Although the militia arrested several people for the violence, all were acquitted the next day.

This fight was so large and so embarrassing to local leaders that it spurred a movement to merge the villages of Salina and Syracuse as a single City in order to eliminate the rivalry that had led to the riot. Syracuse received its City Charter four years later, and the new municipality encompassed the former villages of Syracuse and Salina.

The details of this story suggest a few ideas to commemorate the event. It took place on New Year’s Day—an annual holiday that already provides an excuse for festivity. A simple party is one option, or Syracuse could host a New Year’s parade like those in Philadelphia and Pasadena. A parade could trace the route of the Salina ‘roughs’ from Washington Square down North Salina Street to Downtown. Cook’s Coffee House is gone, and the bank that now occupies its site probably isn’t a good venue for a party, but the parade could end at Clinton Square or indoors at the event space in the lobby of the old Onondaga Bank. Cook’s well-documented interior suggests an obvious theme for party decorations—birds and mirrors—and the cursing parrot makes a great mascot. Any of these motifs would also work well for any bar that wants to host a New Year’s Bash or even for any private party.

As city origin stories go, Cook’s Coffee House Riot doesn’t have the mythic grandeur of Romulus and Remus or the principled optimism of Penn’s charter, but it’s fun, and it’s ours. This is the sort of story we should tell to build up a shared sense of our community’s history. And if we can throw a big party while we’re at it, that’s all the better.

Syracuse: Four Sport Town

Community

By Alex Lawson

Syracuse is America’s premier second-tier sports town. In Spring and Summer we have the Syracuse Mets, in Fall it’s SU football, then in Winter through to Spring it’s the Crunch and Orange Basketball. With the Crunch, the Mets, and Orange football and basketball, we’ve got teams competing in the second-highest league of each of the ‘big four’ sports: the AHL, AAA baseball, Power Four college football, and Power Five college basketball. All twelve months of the year, you can catch a pretty well-attended game featuring a pretty high level of competition for a pretty reasonable price.

That’s pretty cool for a metro area this size, but what’s even cooler is that Syracuse is the only town in America where this is true. Of the more than 100 cities with a AAA baseball team, and AHL hockey team, a Power Four college football team, and a Power Five college basketball team, none besides Syracuse has all four.

Some come close. Bigger cities like Chicago and Los Angeles boast big universities and one or two minor league teams, but those are really major league towns. Others—like Columbus, OH—overshoot the mark by having one major league team alongside a few minor league and college programs. Places like Des Moines have a nearby neighbor like Ames that round out their complement of second-tier teams, but they can’t make it on their own.

The four other towns that come closest are Durham, Louisville, Tucson, and Austin. Durham has the Duke Blue Devils and the Durham Bulls, but no AHL team (the NHL Hurricanes play in nearby Raleigh). Louisville has the AAA Bats and the Cardinals competing in the ACC, and they used to have an AHL franchise too, but the Panthers left town in 2001. Tucson has the AHL Roadrunners and the University of Arizona Wildcats, but their pro baseball team plays in the Mexican Pacific League—well below AAA. Austin is home to the Texas Longhorns, and the Austin metro area includes the suburban municipalities of Round Rock, TX (with their AAA baseball team, the Express) and Cedar Park, TX (home of the Texas Stars).

Tonight, ESPN is televising the basketball game between the Tennessee Volunteers and the Syracuse Orange to a national audience, and you can still buy pretty cheap tickets to join fifteen to twenty thousand other people in watching that game in person. It’s a little thing, but it’s part of what makes this a fun place to live, and we are uniquely lucky to have it.

Centro’s Better Bus Proposal

Transportation,

Centro just released the first draft of its proposed network redesign—Better Bus. The transit agency is proposing its first full network redesign in decades in response to changes in regional travel patterns (fewer riders need traditional Downtown-centric 9-to-5 rush hour service), changes in staffing (Centro has not been able to hire a full complement of bus operators since the depths of the pandemic, and this has forced service cuts), and changes in service type (planned BRT or Bus Rapid Transit lines and on-demand service similar to Uber pool will offer fundamentally different services that affect the entire network). This is just a first draft of the network redesign and will likely change in response to public feedback, but Better Bus is on track to go into service in early 2027.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the changes they’re proposing:

Better Service Frequency

The number one thing riders and non-riders alike want from Centro is for the buses to run more often. Existing service frequencies fluctuate across the system but rarely get better than 2 buses an hour. This makes transit a poor choice for most trips and wastes the time of the people who do ride the bus.

Better Bus significantly improves service frequencies along three planned BRT corridors. Lines operating along South Salina, James Street, South Ave, North Salina, and to University Hill will see buses running every 20 to 25 minutes all day every day. (These frequencies will get even better—10-15 minutes headways—once Centro implements BRT in 2028.)

Another two lines have significantly improved service frequencies that bear mention. The Grant Boulevard bus to Shop City will run much more frequently than it does now with 25 minute headways during the morning and evening rush and 40 minute headways midday and evenings. East Genesee Street will also see significantly improved service between Salt Springs Road and the Hub where two separate lines—the 76 and 62 buses—will each run every 45 minutes but be staggered so that they provide 22.5 minute headways where they overlap. These two corridors would be good candidates for future upgrades to BRT service when the resources become available.

Almost all other lines will run with headways between 30 and 60 minutes. Although this is still well below the service frequencies people need, they are a significant improvement over the status quo.

Expanded Night and Weekend Service

Right now, Centro runs buses once every 80 minutes on nights and only slightly more frequently on weekends. If you’re Downtown after 5 PM, you have the option of catching a bus home at 6:20, 7:40, 9:00, 10:20, or 11:40—if your bus even runs at all. This is a massive gap in service that makes public transit a poor option for both increasingly common non-traditional commuting and the non-work trips that make up so much of people’s social and family lives.

Better Bus would massively improve service frequencies on nights and weekends. 14 proposed lines run service at least once an hour into the evening, and 3 will provide service every 30 minutes or better. Many routes will also run later into the night. Better Bus proposes similar service improvements on Saturdays and Sundays for most routes.

Multiple Transfer Points

Currently, all connections between different bus lines occur at Centro’s Downtown Hub. The entire network is designed around bringing multiple buses to that single point at the same time to facilitate transfers, and there is no other spot in Onondaga County where route designs and timetables line up such that it would make sense to try and change buses. That allows Centro to provide seamless transfers between low-frequency routes, but it also reduces service frequency and requires many riders to ride all the way Downtown even when it’s well out of their way.

Better Bus proposes several changes to this system. The first and most obvious is that there will be several bus lines that do not run through the Hub. These include the crosstown 64 bus which will run through Downtown without stopping at the Hub, the 10 and 40 buses which act like extensions of Downtown-bound buses, and the 26 and City Loop buses which run circumferential routes connecting points outside of Downtown.

Beyond those route design changes, Centro is also amending its timetables to get away from the lineup. Proposed headways suggest that redesigned routes will take different amounts of time to complete, so it won’t be possible for all the buses to depart from and then return to the Hub at the same time. Instead of a series of lineups throughout the day, the Hub will see single buses running different routes arriving and departing almost constantly.

Rome MOVE

MOVE On-Demand Service

Centro hopes to find the operating resources for all of these service improvements by saving money on low-ridership corridors. In particular, it is replacing fixed-route service in three zones—Fayetteville/Manlius, Malloy Road/Carrier Circle, and Liverpool/Henry Clay Boulevard—with MOVE, a new-to-Syracuse on-demand transit service. MOVE will work like Uber Pool and dispatch small ADA accessible transit vans in response to real-time requests from riders. Centro has already launched this type of service in Rome where it has freed up resources to provide better frequency on remaining fixed-line service and led to substantial ridership gains across the system.

Service Cuts

Centro is also eliminating service in areas not covered by MOVE. In some cases, that means removing route deviations. Deviations on the current 64 bus to Western Lights, for instance, essentially mean that it is actually four different routes. All of those deviations add complexity and reduce frequency, and Better Bus proposes eliminating them on the 64 bus and many other routes to focus on one core line to provide better predictability and frequency.

In other cases Better Bus proposes removing routes entirely. The most notable is the 54 bus on Midland. Some portions of that route will be covered by other lines, and other portions are within walking distance of improved lines, but fewer people will be able to catch a bus on Midland if Better Bus is implemented as proposed. That’s the kind of tradeoff many current riders have expressed a willingness to make, but it is worth scrutinizing the tradeoff all the same.

Centro released this draft proposal to get the public’s feedback, so let them know what you think! There are more tools to explore the proposed changes at the project’s website as well as an online survey that will allow you to make route-specific recommendations. You can also view the below map that shows the proposed lines in different colors. You can interact with this map and filter the system by frequency at this link.

Centro made a lot of small decisions in the process of redrawing these bus lines and reworking these timetables, and there is ample opportunity to point out places where any specific line’s zig might work better as a zag or where better midday frequency might be preferable to robust rush hour service. That’s all great feedback that should inform a second draft of the plan.

Keep in mind, though, the tradeoffs involved. Adding frequency to any line or making it longer necessarily requires reducing frequency somewhere else. Centro simply does not have enough bus operators to provide high frequency service in every neighborhood.

The good news is that Centro is moving in the right direction. The principles that lie behind Better Bus—focusing resources to improve service where it will help the most people and yield the highest ridership—are good ones. If Centro continues to follow them and if we can get them more operating resources, Syracuse will build the transit system we need and deserve.