A Brief History of Land Use Planning in Nashville Nashville has experienced many cycles of growth and development in its more than 200-year history. Many of those cycles have corresponded with and been influenced by population growth and technological change that impacted how we relate to and use the land we occupy. In each of those cycles, we find in the historical record evidence of the same tension many feel in Nashville today – that of identifying itself as growing, future-oriented, and open to cultural adaptation yet also a city that does not want to lose touch with its existing character, natural environment, and cultural hallmarks that draw people here and convince them to stay for generations. Over the last 100 years, land use planning and zoning have been one of the most influential tools in shaping the development of our city. It is worth reflecting on the context in which those tools were used and how they have changed over the decades to learn how we might continue to modernize them to meet the needs of Nashville today and Nashville in the future. In the earliest days of Nashville’s history, prior to wide-spread use of land use and zoning laws, the primary legal mechanism for controlling development and settling disputes between neighbors over their respective use of the land and its impact on others — whether such use had an adverse effect on value or quality of life or both — was through common law nuisance actions.1 Over time, the cost of litigation and the inability of nuisance law to reach all questionable or incompatible land uses — much less prevent them — led communities to search for more effective alternatives. Creating a plan for the reasonable spacing of buildings and streets was a model used by many of the earliest cities in the American colonies for public health reasons, to minimize disputes between property owners, and to attract development.2 When Nashville (originally Nashborough) was created by an Act of the North Carolina Legislature in 1784, the 200 acre tract of land was surveyed and a plan for the city was developed, establishing 27 rectangular blocks, containing 165 lots, laid out in a grid pattern with four acres reserved for the construction of a Public Square.3 However, proactive land-use planning and zoning didn’t become more
widespread until the late 19th century when the Industrial Revolution brought dramatic changes to the way people lived and worked in cities. Cities grew dramatically in the latter half of the 1800s as people left rural areas and moved to the cities seeking jobs in factories and offices. With no rules to govern the development, these new growth patterns led to deplorable public health conditions in most cities. Specifically in Nashville during this time, early residential areas that extended from the central business district (Germantown to the north, Edgefield to the east, and Rutledge Hill to the south) were soon a mix of residential alongside industrial and manufacturing businesses. Following completion of the Capitol building in 1853, new businesses and government offices flowed into the core of downtown resulting in most of the grand single-family homes that had been built along the north and west slopes of Capital Hill being converted into boarding houses as families left the city center. Around the same time as industrial and business growth changed the character of the city center, technological advancements in transportation made it possible to connect the central business district of the city with suburban developments along the fringe.4 By the early 20th century, with the myriad new land uses that came with the Industrial Revolution, people began to look to their elected officials for less costly and more effective ways to resolve land use conflicts, improve the value of the land, and improve public health. Tennessee followed this trend and began creating governmental bodies dedicated to proactive land-use planning. The General Assembly authorized the creation of the Memphis planning commission in 1920. Planning commissions were authorized for Knoxville and Chattanooga in 1922 and for Nashville in 1925. Tennessee’s local governments began seeking authority to zone land uses around the same time. The General Assembly passed the first enabling legislation authorizing counties and municipalities to enact zoning regulations in 19355 based on model legislation created in 1926 by the Department of Commerce under then Secretary of Commerce Herbert (continued on page 8) (continued on page 00)
OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2023 | NASHVILLE BAR JOURNAL
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