Cambridge City Hall. Photo by Andrew Cosand | Flickr | CC BY 2.0
Cambridge officials gave final approval to expansion of multifamily housing under a zoning change that enables the construction of 4- to 6-story buildings across the city.
Monday’s 8-1 vote of the City Council followed more than a year of debate on the most effective local strategy to tackle the housing affordability crisis.
“This will be a landmark reform where the zoning map of Cambridge won’t look like a copy-and-paste of a redlining map,” Councilor Burhan Azeem said.
Azeem and Councilor Sumbul Siddiqui originally proposed allowing 6-story multifamily buildings across the city, including the remaining single-family zoning districts concentrated in West Cambridge. The final version prevailed after councilors last month rejected a version that would have given density bonuses for projects including income-restricted units.
Both supporters and opponents predicted the vote will have dramatic and long-lasting effects.
“We can’t just have a community of folks who can afford $2 million homes and folks who qualify for subsidized housing,” Vice Mayor Marc McGovern said. “That is not a healthy community.”
An analysis by city staff presented at a Jan. 16 committee meeting estimated that the upzoning could generate nearly 1,200 new homes of all types by 2030, including 220 affordable units, and 3,590 units by 2040, including 660 affordable units.
But those numbers are significantly smaller than the 1,630 homes by 2030 and 4,880 homes by 2040 that city staff guessed would be built under Azeem and Siddiqui’s original proposal. Without the upzoning city staff estimated only 350 new homes, including 30 affordable ones, would have been created by 2040.
“We’ve had extensive debate on this over the past term, and while perspectives have differed, the need for action has been clear. Some have argued that zoning reform will not solve the housing crisis, and they’re right—no single policy will. But progress happens through sustained action, not inaction. Eliminating exclusionary zoning and removing barriers to development is a necessary step toward increasing supply and ensuring more people have access to housing,” Siddiqui said in a statement issued through Abundant Homes MA, a statewide housing advocacy group allied with upzoning champion A Better Cambridge.
The lone dissenter, Councilor Catherine Zusy, said the results will create “physical and psychological havoc” as apartment buildings replace single-family homes. Zusy predicted that most of the new buildings will contain luxury units with premium rents.
The rezoning allows construction of buildings conforming to the new standards by-right, removing the requirement that developers obtain special permits from the Planning Board. It also eliminates the design review portion of the review, prompting criticism from opponents about insufficient oversight over substandard building designs.
A map of areas, in yellow-green, covered by the upzoning. Image courtesy of the city of Cambridge
In practice, the new zoning standards will create the smoothest path for fully market-rate, 4-story buildings with up to 9 units or 9,999 square feet in size that cover up to 70 percent of a lot. The city’s affordable housing requirements – 20 percent of units at 80 percent of area median income – kick in for buildings 10 units or 10,000 square feet in size. And the changes approved Monday give significant power to abutters who want to turn back projects that seek to go outside lot-coverage, setback and height limits.
Supporters blamed the city’s existing zoning on perpetuating racial and economic disparities.
Opponents predicted the additional density will drive up land prices, and encourage more competition among developers to acquire sites.
“The proposed amendments are worse and are going to promote mainly luxury homes,” architect Alex Van Praagh said during a public comment period before the board’s vote. “I’ve been approached by clients asking what the maximum can be done by-right under the proposed zoning.”
Affordable housing developers have respondeded enthusiastically to Cambridge’s previous citywide rezoning to encourage all-affordable projects by offering building heights up to 15 stories in certain areas.
WinnCompanies, Capstone Communities, B’nai Brith Housing and Homeowners Rehab all have proposed income-restricted projects under the all-affordable overlay.
In a document he posted on the social media platform Bluesky, Azeem said he expected another upzoning reform process, focused on the city’s corridors and squares, to begin “later this year”.
Editor’s Note: This story has been updated with comment from Councilor Sumbul Siddiqqui.
