Opinion ID: 1391168
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: restrictions of buildable area

Text: The buildable area, i. e., the acreage on which buildings in a B-2 zone may be constructed, is restricted by 8A to what remains after compliance with the 75-foot setback line on the front, the requirement of a 10-foot perimeter open space adjoining the property lines on the sides and rear, and the requirement of a 10-foot perimeter open space adjacent to buildings. The perimeters of open-space areas must be increased (and the buildable area decreased) by one foot for each foot of building height in excess of 35 feet, and no part of such open spaces may be used for automobile parking. The size of the buildable area is also affected by the restriction that no building may be constructed on lots less than 150 feet wide (or 120 feet wide for lots existing on January 10, 1973). Code § 15.1-486 authorizes local governing bodies to adopt ordinances to regulate, restrict, permit, prohibit, and determine. . . [t]he areas and dimensions of land, water, and air space to be occupied by buildings, structures and uses, and of courts, yards, and other open spaces to be left unoccupied by uses and structures. . . . Standing alone, this language is broad enough to authorize the use of the police power to impose reasonable restrictions on buildable area. Repeatedly, we have recognized the authority of local governments to adopt setback line restrictions. French v. Town of Clintwood, 203 Va. 562, 125 S.E.2d 798 (1962); Nusbaum v. Norfolk, 151 Va. 801, 145 S.E. 257 (1928); Gorieb v. Fox, 145 Va. 554, 134 S.E. 914, aff'd., 274 U.S. 603, 47 S.Ct. 675, 71 L.Ed. 1228 (1926). The power to prescribe reasonable minimum lot width restrictions and open space requirements is clearly within the ambit of Code § 15.1-486, and, by necessary implication from the authority to regulate, so is the power to require that open spaces on privately-owned land be landscaped and maintained in good condition. Here, each of these requirements and restrictions on buildable area enjoys the presumption of legislative reasonableness, and the burden of rebutting the presumption, by evidence of the unreasonableness of each, rested upon the landowners. Considering each in isolation from the others, we believe that the landowners failed to overcome that presumption. However, while local governments have been given the power to enact ordinances imposing such building restrictions and open space requirements, such ordinances to be valid must be to promote public health, safety, prosperity, morals and public welfare. The mere power to enact an ordinance . . . does not carry with it the right arbitrarily or capriciously to deprive a person of the legitimate use of his property. Board of Supervisors v. Carper, supra, 200 Va. at 662, 107 S.E.2d at 396. With the Carper rule in mind, we must consider these building restrictions and requirements and examine their cumulative effect. The landowners' evidence shows that the setback restriction and the open-space requirements would prohibit construction of buildings upon a total of 16.78 acres, or about 29% of the 58 acres classified B-2. Based upon market values prior to the enactment of 8A, the value of the 16.78 acres was $1,959,167.35. These acreage and valuation computations make no allowance for any restriction of buildable area that may result from surpassing the building height limitation or from reservation of acreage for parking needs. Parking on the service road and open spaces is forbidden. If businesses are to serve customers, landowners must provide space for parking in some area not reserved for open spaces. That area must be at least as wide as twice the length of an automobile to enable it to maneuver into and out of parking position. The landowners introduced an expert witness whose testimony, illustrated by exhibits, showed that the buildable area restrictions as a whole rendered 17 of the 51 B-2 lots undevelopable. Disputing this evidence, the Board says that 8 of the 17 lots are developable because two or more adjacent lots are held in common ownership. Since the restrictions are addressed to individual lots, individually assessed and taxed, and since an owner of several lots (any of which he has the right to sell) cannot be deprived of the beneficial use of any individual lot, we fail to see how common ownership is constitutionally significant. The Board also argues that, while some of the individually-owned lots are too small for B-2 development, they are large enough to accommodate some productive development under a variance. As we noted in Part I, supra, however, if development requires a variance so broad that it violates the spirit and purpose of 8A, an application for a variance would be futile. [10] On cross-examination, the Board's witness, the real estate assessor and financial director of the City of Williamsburg, testified that [s]ales have stopped after the B-2 zone went into effect. The landowners' witness, a real estate broker, testified that, based upon prior sales of similar property, the market value of the subject property prior to adoption of 8A had been $2.69 per square foot and thereafter had declined to $1.50 per square foot, while the values of neighboring properties had remained constant. Although, as we have said, we are of opinion that the landowners' evidence was insufficient to overcome the legislative presumption of reasonableness as it pertains to these buildable area restrictions individually, we hold that their evidence was sufficient to show that, collectively, those restrictions are unreasonable and bear no substantial relationship to the public health, safety, or welfare; that such evidence overcame the presumption of legislative validity; that the Board's evidence of reasonableness was insufficient to make the question fairly debatable; and that the cumulative effect of the restrictions upon buildable area was such as to deprive a person of the legitimate use of his property in violation of the rule in Carper.