Bend may move to allow more duplexes, triplexes

The city of Bend may soon allow more duplexes and triplexes in residential neighborhoods as another way to meet the growing demand for more affordable housing.

Planning staff will make a presentation and seek city council direction Wednesday evening on a proposed development code update, supported by a majority of the Bend Planning Commission, to allow duplexes on 8,000-square-foot lots and triplexes on 10,000-square-foot lots in standard-density residential (RS) zones, without calculating density on an individual lot basis.

A housing needs analysis directs Bend to plan for about 38,500 more people between 2008 and 2028, requiring nearly 16,700 new dwelling units, according to an issue summary prepared by Planning Manager Colin Stephens and Senior Code Planner Pauline Hardie.

“Bend’s housing needs are changing, and key demographic changes are occurring in Bend and across the nation,” they said. “Baby Boomers may need less costly housing or may choose to downsize their housing,” resulting in more demand for smaller homes, cottages, accessory dwelling units, townhomes, apartments and condominiums.

The need also is fueled by growth in millennial households increasing the need for affordable housing for renters and homeowners alike.

These kinds of homes are often called the “missing middle housing,” referring to types of housing that can provide more than one unit per lot “in a way that is compatible in scale with single-family homes,” the summary states.

Bend 2030 and the Bend Collaborative Housing Workgroup developed a dozen recommendations to meet that housing need, including allowing fourplexes in the RS-zoned district.

After those recommendations over a year ago, councilors directed the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee to evaluate, develop and prioritize the proposals.

Last fall, the committee recommended allowing duplexes on 4,000-square-foot-lots, triplexes on 5,000-square-foot lots and fourplexes on 6,000-square-foot lots in the RS district. Councilors asked the planning commission to review those proposals.

At present, according to the city, it takes a minimum lot size of nearly 12,000 square feet for a duplex to comply with the city’s zoning density requirements, and nearly 18,000-square-feet for a triplex in standard-density residential zones, which now allow a density of 4 to 7.3 units per acre..

The planning commission also looked at what other cities were doing to permit such multi-unit housing in the RS district, and decided to propose what comes before councilors on Wednesday.

To control the mass and scale of the duplexes and triplexes, the planners said the city could consider a floor area ratio (FAR) of .60, consistent with that of single-family homes with an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) sharing the lot. The floor area ratio is the ratio of a building’s total floor area to the size of the parcel on which it’s built.