Zoning & entitlements
Site plan / design review
Review of a project's layout, massing, and design for conformity with development standards — objective-only where state housing law protects the project.
Definition
Site plan and design review checks siting, massing, access, landscaping and architecture against the jurisdiction's development standards under its zoning ordinance. Local codes make it ministerial in some districts and discretionary in others — the municipal code's own framing, not state law, decides which.
For housing development projects the state narrows it: the Housing Accountability Act confines disapprovals and density reductions to objective standards, and SB 330 caps a compliant project at five hearings.
Why it matters in an underwrite
Design review is historically where subjective delay lived — open-ended "articulation" and "character" cycles, each costing a redesign fee and months of carry. For protected housing, hold the process to the objective frame: ask which written, measurable standard each comment enforces, and track the five-hearing count on the record. Every review cycle avoided is direct schedule and fee savings.
Sources & related guides
See also
See the term in the law itself
Read the controlling text in the Code Library, or ask the AI how it applies to your project.
Last reviewed 2026-07-29. General information, not legal advice.