Commercial zoning update

On September 11, 2006 , the Bloomington City Council adopted an ordinance that creates new and revised neighborhood and freeway commercial zoning districts and standards. Based on over a years input from the City Council, Planning Commission, Traffic and Transportation Advisory Commission, and a Business Focus Group, the ordinance included the amendment of two existing neighborhood commercial zoning districts (B-1 and B-2), the creation of one new neighborhood commercial zoning district (B-4) and the creation of five new freeway commercial zoning districts (C-1, C-2, C-3, C-4 and C-5). The ordinance also created new menu board sign standards, commercial structure design standards, sidewalk standards, drive-through standards, standards for motor vehicle sales uses and standards for residential uses in commercial zoning districts.

Unless requested by a landowner, rezoning of land to the new districts will generally not occur until the ongoing strategic planning process has concluded. At that time, the Council will determine how land zoned to the old neighborhood commercial districts (B-3 and CB) and the old freeway commercial districts (CR-1, C0-0.5, CO-1, CS-0.5, CS-1, FD-1, FD-2, RO-24, RO-50) will be rezoned to the new commercial zoning districts.

The adoption of new commercial zoning districts and standards is part of a larger project to comprehensively update the Bloomington Zoning Ordinance and to reevaluate and update the existing system zoning districts. These districts can be divided into five "families of districts", namely Neighborhood Commercial, Freeway Commercial, Residential, Industrial and specialized South Loop districts. Many of the existing thirty base zoning districts and seven overlay zoning districts were drafted in the 1950s and no longer support City objectives.

MAP: Bloomington's Five "Families of Zoning Districts" (245KB PDF)

Additional information

Ordinance as adopted on 9/11/06 - New Commercial Zoning Districts and Standards (306KB, 38-page PDF)
Underlying principles and assumptions (22KB, 2-page PDF)
Frequently asked questions on nonconformity
Background on wider project to update Bloomington's Zoning Ordinance
Commercial Zoning Focus Group
Administrative Hearing Summary (24KB, 3-page PDF)
Rezoning
Meeting schedule
Chronology (17KB, 2-page PDF)
Staff report (58KB, 10-page PDF)
Staff memorandum responding to comments (2.4MB, 23-page PDF)
Note: If you have problems downloading this PDF file because of its size, contact the Planning Division by e-mail (planning@ci.bloomington.mn.us) or at 952-563-8920 to arrange for an alternate method of receiving the file.

For more information or if you have comments or suggestions concerning Zoning Ordinance revisions, contact:

Planning Division
PH: 952-563-8920, FAX: 952-563-8949
E-mail: planning@ci.bloomington.mn.us