Code Lineage Report
How much of New York City’s 1916 Building Zone Resolution, the first comprehensive zoning ordinance in America, lives on in your code? We compared your code with seventeen hallmarks of the 1916 resolution.
New York 1916 inheritance
The seventeen hallmarks, left to right
What we found
Hallmark by hallmark
Left: what New York did in 1916. Right: what your code says, with the section it comes from, so your staff can check it.
Not from New York
Provisions with no counterpart in the 1916 resolution: clues to your code’s other sources.
Where it may have come from
How the comparison works
Each hallmark is a device that defined New York’s 1916 resolution, from its three overlay maps and street-width height rule to its board of appeals and owner protest petition. We mark each as copied (carried over nearly intact, often in the same words), adapted (same idea, different numbers or mechanics), replaced (the topic is handled by a different device), or absent.
Copied counts fully and adapted counts half. Hallmarks central to New York’s scheme count double, so the percentage reflects how much of the core design survives, not just how many phrases match.
What this report is, and is not
This is a historical and comparative reading of the document you provided. It does not account for amendments not included in the document or for how the code is administered in practice.
It is educational and is not legal advice. See our terms of use. Read more in Sean Suder’s paper, All Zoning Is New York City Zoning.
An inherited code doesn’t need defending or demolishing.
It needs calibrating. A ZoneCo zoning diagnostic tests every part of your code against your plan and the places you actually have, and shows what to keep, what to change, and what to retire.