The Beacon Center has released part two of the Tennessee Zoning Atlas, focusing on West Tennessee. This iteration of the atlas covers eight West Tennessee counties in the Memphis and Jackson areas. The counties included are Shelby, Fayette, Tipton, Chester, Crockett, Gibson, Madison, and Haywood County (home of the future Blue Oval City Ford assembly plant).

As West Tennessee continues to grow, especially with the promise of thousands of jobs for Blue Oval City, Beacon compared zoning restrictions in West Tennessee and provided an interactive resource demonstrating how strict local zoning regulations make it hard to buy a starter home or find an affordable apartment. The Zoning Atlas highlights the need for local governments to reduce or eliminate burdensome and arbitrary restrictions on housing supply. This is the first such look at zoning in the West Tennessee area. You can explore the full interactive map here and read the Middle Tennessee Zoning Atlas here.

Key Takeaways:

• Despite being the largest city in West Tennessee, and the second largest city in the state, Memphis only allows apartments on four percent of land in the city, making it harder for lower-income residents to find more affordable housing. This even pales in comparison to Nashville, which allows apartments on 11% of city land.
• Madison County, home of Jackson, allows accessory dwelling units (ADUs), otherwise known as mother-in-law suites, on over 94% of zoned land. This makes Madison County the most welcoming jurisdiction for ADUs by a large margin in West Tennessee.
• A number of cities in West Tennessee, including Arlington, Collierville, and Threeway outright ban any duplex or multifamily housing through their zoning code.
• Haywood County, on the other hand, is the most welcoming jurisdiction for duplexes and multi-family homes, with zoning laws allowing for multi-family homes to be built on nearly 99% of county land.

Beacon Policy Director Ron Shultis said: “Blue Oval represents a huge opportunity for West Tennessee communities to experience economic growth not seen in decades. However, it’s up to local policymakers to adequately plan for the infrastructure needs to manage that growth, including housing. West Tennessee policymakers should enact pro-housing reforms to ensure there are enough options for those looking for a starter home or workers moving into the area that need affordable places to rent.

“Jackson and Madison County are prime examples for the rest of West Tennessee to follow, recently making ADUs almost universally legal. We need to ensure there are enough affordable options for new Tennesseans and protect existing residents from being priced out of their communities, especially for low and middle-income West Tennesseans.”

To explore the West Tennessee Zoning Atlas, click here.