A bucolic landscape, fresh air, quiet country roads. It's an idyllic picture that pulls hundreds of Michigan families out of our state's cities and leaves rural communities scrambling to maintain their character and heritage in the face of enormous growth pressures. As the effects of urban sprawl began to take hold in Michigan's agricultural communities, many local officials started zoning for large lots-one house for every three-, five- or ten-acre parcel-to protect the places they grew up in. The tactic is failing, according to new research to be released this summer by the Michigan Environmental Council in conjunction with the Michigan Association of Realtors and funded by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation's People and Land.

MEC sampled rural townships on the sprawl fringe throughout Michigan, weighing their use of large lot zoning against their success at stemming the tide of development. Findings show that zoning for large-sized residential lots does not protect rural character or effectively direct residential growth. Rather than slowing development, the practice tends to spread it out over a larger geographic area, intensifying the attendant headaches of traffic, infrastructure maintenance and pollution.

The study also found potential home buyers can meet their needs without investing in a large lot. Home buyers identified community character as more important than lot size and articulated a need for more housing choices. Home builders also showed a preference for more dense developments, often citing three or seven units per acre as an ideal concentration.

MEC will make a series of policy recommendations for state and local officials based on these findings, including exchanging "minimum lot size" zoning for "zoning by density," using cluster zoning more frequently and improving the mechanisms for coordinated planning of infrastructure and land development on a regional basis.

Consuming Land, Losing Character will be available on the MEC web site on August 1. Contact Brad Garmon at bradmec@voyager.net for more information.

Take action! Perhaps the most fiendish culprit in the large-lot story is the use of Agricultural-Residential (A/R) zoning. Neither preservation nor development oriented, the A/R zone is too ambiguous to be functional.

Visit your township hall to find out if A/R zoning is prevalent in your community and urge your township officials to make up their minds between farms and houses by replacing it with a more appropriate zoning definition.