Fighting Fire with FARĬities around the world regulate density by capping the maximum allowable FAR for new construction. Even hyper-dense Manhattan has a residential FAR of only four. The entire city of New York has a residential FAR of only 1.2. Most residential neighborhoods in the United States have FARs of one or less-the de facto standard for a single-family dwelling with two stories. A 20-story building covering half the lot will also have an FAR of about ten. A 10-story building covering the whole lot will have an FAR of approximately ten. Today, one of the main ways that cities measure density is through the floor area ratio (FAR)-which tells how much building space is provided per square foot or meter of land.

How did such a fantastic place come to be? Take my hand and join me on a journey to see how it all began. Welcome to FARtopia-a magical place-where housing is unaffordable for most of the population, and any suggestion of knocking down an older building to replace it with a taller one is met with swift and fierce shaming where the status quo is king, and any change that might make life better for its people is instantly vetoed where the residents live by their motto: ne in terram meam. My three-part series on the 1916 New York Zoning Resolution can be read here. Finally, Part IV will discuss how FAR regulations spread to the rest of the world. Following that, Part III will cover how the FAR came to be adopted citywide in the 1961 New York City Zoning Resolution. Part II will be about how the FAR was formalized and popularized during the Great Depression. Part I is about the birth of the FAR in the 1920s. It does not store any personal data.Author’s note: This post is Part I of a four-part series on the birth and growth of modern zoning, focusing on the planning tool the Floor Area Ratio (FAR). The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category 'Performance'. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category 'Other. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category 'Necessary'.

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