Sense and Sensibility: Two Stories, 30 Feet

The Short Version

On July 30, the Planning Commission reached a working consensus to cap Central Business District (CBD) buildings at two stories and 30 feet, down from the three stories and 35 feet that was written into the new code. It is a consensus, not a final vote. The public hearing is Thursday, August 20 at 5:30 p.m., and that is the last scheduled chance for residents to weigh in before the language is set.

Two dates. Put them in your calendar now:

1. Monday, August 17 — the DDA Streetscape survey was EXTENDED Nine days left.

2. Thursday, August 20 at 5:30 p.m. — public hearing on the two-story cap. This is the one that decides it.

Everything below is the why: how the Commission got here, what Beckett & Raeder’s exit signals, what your neighbors said at the podium, and the open question of an Architectural Review Committee. Five-minute read. The last section asks for volunteers, so it’s worth getting to the end.

Also This Week

• Downtown Development Authority (DDA): The community has 9 days to contribute to the next step of the $500,000 Streetscape DDA initiative. Please reference the images for each of the study areas and select the improvements that you support. If you have no opinion, leave the question blank. HERE is the NEW Survey - Closing August 17

• Request for Proposals (RFP) Update: At its July 22 meeting, Council voted 4–0 (one member absent) to issue a Request for Proposal (RFP) for city planner services. Beckett & Raeder was welcome to bid. Instead, on July 24, the firm sent a letter terminating its existing contracts with the City.

• Harbor Market: Site-plan changes received contingent approval at the July 16th meeting for parking lot improvement and 8 new spaces. A big thank you to the Harbor Market and management for Recycle Access.

• State Zoning Pre-Emption: As of August 1, the nine-bill Michigan zoning-preemption package (House Bills 5529–5532 and 5581–5585) has not passed either chamber and is not law. The bills got a hearing before the House Government Operations Committee on May 14, but remain in committee with no reported vote. Harbor Springs’ local zoning authority is unchanged for now, worth keeping on your radar. Track it here.

Two Stories, 30 Feet

On July 30, 2026, the Planning Commission reached a working consensus: buildings in the Central Business District (CBD) should be capped at two stories and 30 feet. It’s a modest-sounding number, but it settles a debate that has run through Harbor Springs for decades: how tall is too tall for a town that has always defined itself by scale as much as by charm.

The timing matters. On July 22, Council voted to open a Request for Proposal (RFP) for city planner services. Beckett & Raeder, the planning firm that has guided the city for several years, was welcome to bid. Two days later, it instead terminated its existing contracts. Its guidance had pointed toward more height, more upper-floor housing, and a downtown that stayed busier later into the evening. That’s a legitimate model, and it has worked well for other communities looking to grow into something new. Harbor Springs was asking a different question: how does a small town stay recognizably itself while it grows?

On July 30, the Commission answered that question. Choosing two stories and 30 feet over the three stories and 35 feet was, in effect, the community reclaiming the authority to define its own progress. Beckett & Raeder’s exit points in the same direction. Offered the chance to compete for continued work, the firm chose to end its contracts instead.

None of this amounts to a rejection of planning, or of economic vitality. It’s a rejection of one specific assumption: that every downtown that wants to succeed has to grow taller, get louder, and become more urban. Harbor Springs is testing a different premise: that preservation itself is an economic strategy, and that keeping the town’s low-slung, walkable character intact is worth more than the upside of added density.

There’s still a step ahead. The August 20 public hearing is the next chance for residents to weigh in before anything is finalized, and Commissioner Kenny Stewart’s advice is worth repeating: come without “pitchforks in hand.” Residents who show up with facts, respect, and appreciation will do right by the Commissioners who listened carefully, exercised independent judgment, and landed on two stories and 30 feet.

Comments during this Meeting

Pam Tarchinski: “There should be yard maintenance standards — lawns, including parkways, mowed at least once a month between May 1 and October 1, leaves removed each autumn, and storm damage cleaned up within six months. Wild or natural gardens should be monitored for invasive species so they don’t spread to neighboring properties. And a ‘Keep Harbor Harbor’ provision: structures, built features, natural features, and views 50 years or older should be assessed for architectural, cultural, historical, and environmental value before being torn down.” She noted the Commission currently is fortunate to have both a landscape architect and a historic preservationist among its members, whose expertise could help draft clear language on this.

Tim Patton: As a boater, he said his perspective comes from viewing downtown from the water. He described one existing corner development — where an elevated Main Street level sits above a lower Bay Street level — as reading like a single large mass from the harbor, even though it looks more modest from the street. From the water, he said, it looks “out of place” against the rest of the quaint downtown. He suggested the Commission weigh sight lines from multiple vantage points, not just the street, when considering massing.

Carter Williams: “The Planning Commission should pay close attention to the Future Land Use Map. The current Master Plan appears to call for roughly doubling the Central Business District — expanding it east to Zoll, north of Third Street, and into other areas. During the earlier zoning process, I was told my house on Bay Street had been placed in the CBD because the map called for expansion in that direction. That designation was reversed, but the map remains. Beckett & Raeder also cited the City’s failure to adhere to the Master Plan as one reason for its departure.

This makes the issue bigger than the zoning changes now being considered. A future Planning Commission could use the Master Plan to justify expanding commercial zoning into nearby residential areas — something many residents there don’t want. If this Commission doesn’t support that expansion, it should amend the Future Land Use Map. If it does, residents should understand that expanding the CBD remains the City’s stated long-term intention.”

Care, not just Code

The most telling moments of the July 30 meeting had nothing to do with zoning language. They came when people spoke as stewards, not stakeholders, and asked a simpler question than any ordinance can answer: what kind of town are we leaving behind?

That question is really the heart of the two-story, 30-foot decision.

It isn’t only a compromise between competing development visions. It’s a recognition the broader Harbor Springs community of year-round residents and voters, seasonal residents and second-home owners, and multigenerational families with enduring ties here, despite showing up to public comment with different priorities, are asking for the same thing: a town that still feels like itself when they wake up in it.

Two stories and 30 feet is practical. It’s also an act of pride, and an act of care, for whoever calls this place home, full time or three months a year.

That came through most clearly in the small, lived-in details. One downtown resident described something no zoning map captures: having to move her car at night, in winter, for snow removal. The median age in Harbor Springs is 62. Building height and sidewalk bumpouts are the interesting argument, but if the median resident is 62, the daily risk downtown isn’t massing. It’s a patch of black ice between the car and the door, or a snow pile too high to climb over to reach the sidewalk. Both are questions of how downtown gets designed. Only one of them is on the agenda.

The waterfront discussion had a similar shift in register. Commissioners and residents weren’t debating setback formulas so much as picturing the town from a boat, from Bay Street, from the vantage points its next generation will actually use. One answer that emerged plainly: whatever gets built under the new code shouldn’t be allowed to block the view of the bluff. That’s not a technical requirement. It’s a promise to the people who’ll stand where we’re standing now!

Jane Austen split Sense and Sensibility between two sisters and spent a novel arguing you need both. Harbor Springs is making a harder claim: they are the same person. The town that cares what a roofline looks like from the water is the same town that needs the ice cleared between the car and the door. One of those shows up in the zoning code. The other one doesn’t, and it should.

And the commissioners themselves modeled something worth naming. They disagreed, corrected each other, and left architectural review boards open for future discussion, without anyone getting talked over or embarrassed for not having every answer yet. That willingness to be uncertain in public, together, did more to humanize the process than any single vote did.

Time for an Architectural Review?

The Planning Commission’s work isn’t finished. Height and story limits set the outer boundary of what can be built, but they don’t, by themselves, control how large a building actually feels when you’re standing on the sidewalk in front of it.

Massing, façade width, roofline, upper-floor setbacks, lot coverage, and how a new building relates to the ones next door: these are the details that decide whether a project fits Harbor Springs or just fits inside the numbers. If the outgoing consultant’s approach favored bigger building forms, the Commission’s next job can be to check whether the existing code language is precise enough to actually prevent an incompatible project, rather than leaving that judgment to officials after an application is already in hand.

Protective doesn’t have to mean frozen in time. The city has real choices here: how the district’s boundaries are drawn, what kind of work triggers a review, what standards apply, and whether that review is advisory or binding. One early preference worth noting: hold off on calling this any kind of a historic overlay until the legal mechanism behind it is actually chosen. The label carries assumptions the city hasn’t settled yet.

An Architectural Review Committee may be the logical next step. But its purpose, its authority, its standards, and who it answers to should all be worked out in the open, not assumed.

That raises a practical question for the community: are there local architects, preservation specialists, builders, landscape architects, planners, historians, or residents with relevant experience who would be willing to volunteer for public working sessions to help build that process from the ground up?

If that’s you, reply to this email or leave a comment below. Walking into the August 20 hearing with a list of names is a far stronger ask than walking in with a good idea.