You’ve heard what the politicians always like to say:

To get any control over what gets built at River Road, we need a redevelopment plan, they insist.

Unless we have a redevelopment plan, the developers can build whatever they want, they wail, evoking the specter of towering , tacky, monstrosities.

But is that true? No.

Absent a redevelopment plan, any new, private development is subject to many federal, state, and local requirements, including plenty of Borough building, affordable housing, and zoning regulations that apply all over town, and some that apply to the Gateway Overlay Districts of River Road in particular.

For a new, private project at River Road, those requirements include the following detailed rules that set strict standards for almost every aspect of a development:

Affordable Housing §69-4A: https://ecode360.com/27401603#31809708

Land Development §165: https://ecode360.com/29899377#29899377

Gateway Overlay District 1 §165-35: https://ecode360.com/6793137?highlight=sidewall&searchId=5252782375618825#29899351

Prohibited: §165-5: https://ecode360.com/6792677#6792677

Health §274-§308: https://ecode360.com/11763943#11763943

Fire Code §136 https://ecode360.com/6792430#6792430

Keep that in mind next time someone tries to tell you that – unless we adopt a redevelopment plan – the developer “can build whatever he wants” or that adopting another plan is “the only way to control what happens at River Road.”