ABSTRACT
Legal validation of zoning did not occur until the Euclid decision in 1926, 1 but a municipal ordinance enacted 300 years earlier actually set the precedents for the control policies applicable to today. As a presage to current limitations on discontinuous development, a Cambridge, Massachusetts statute mandated that buildings could not be erected in outlying regions until the interstices were filled in. Despite this vision, pre-Euclidian zoning mainly constituted impositions placed upon building heights and resolution of nuisance claims. With the advent of Euclid, accompanied by the Department of Commerce’s Standard State and City Planning Enabling Act, zoning rapidly became the most commonly employed development control device. Through charting use districts and regulating building and land plans, land use could be controlled. Specifically, the underlying purpose of zoning is to prevent overcrowding, avoid undue concentrations of population, and to facilitate the adequate provisions of municipal services. This is an indirect strategy in that it impacts population through controlling land use. Basically, four types of zoning regulations have been devised: exclusive zones; denial of multifamily housing; minimum-size standards; and special permits.
