About 50 residents packed into the District E-5 Station of the Boston Police Department on Thursday, Aug. 6 for the in-person West Roxbury Neighborhood Housing rezoning meeting from the Boston Planning Department.

The initiative is aimed at gradually increasing density in West Roxbury, Roslindale and Hyde Park (with a new rezoning initiative coming to Allston and Brighton this fall) by allowing at least one more unit into residential zones, most likely, though not exclusively, through accessory dwelling units (ADUs).

While most have an image of an in-law cottage in a structure detached from the house, Boston Planning Project Manager Will Cohen has repeatedly said during several of the meetings that most ADU units in Boston are likely to be within existing structures – finished basements, finished attics, remodels etc. – and not new buildings, because the fire code makes that extremely difficult in the average-sized lots throughout the Parkway.

The lot sizes were a big point of discussion, as such metrics – along with rear, front, and side yards, building height, permeability (surface drainage), floor plates and other zoning requirements – will be dictating both maximum unit counts, lot coverage and have a significant impact on parking requirements.

The West Roxbury neighborhood has been split up into Dormer-2 (D2), Dormer-3 (D3) and Decker-4 (D4), and there is a Decker-6 district (but it’s not in the West Roxbury iteration of the zoning). There are also other districts, like the garden districts, open space districts and Urban Wild districts, but the discussion was mostly about the housing districts.

The number in the district represents the maximum units it will allow by-right, or as-of-right.

A quick note: there appeared to be some confusion as to what constitutes a zoning violation. A zoning violation means that a property does not conform to the rules of the Boston Zoning Code, and if any plan a property owner submits to Inspectional Services Department (ISD) violates the code, then the property owner has to gain zoning relief from the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA).

According to the Planning Department, about 90 percent of the homes in West Roxbury (and Roslindale and Hyde Park, for that matter) do not conform to current zoning. Cohen said the new zoning won’t be a panacea for all kinds of renovations though; it will just make it easier for many of those renovations to go through without a variance.

“Under the new zoning, the majority of lots will still not conform with one or two things in the zoning,” he said. “We are not saying everyone can do everything, we’re saying instead of everyone breaking all the rules in zoning, most people will break just one or two parts of the zoning. That’s to say there are other parts of the lot where you can still make these renovations easily.”

The ZBA sees hundreds of cases a year, and Cohen said this is kind of the point of Neighborhood Housing. Many, if not most of the cases the ZBA sees are usually small property owners trying to make minor improvements. So those property owners have to make an appointment with the ZBA, wait the average six months to get their hearing, wait through the hearing, and keep a contractor on the line for the plan the whole time. Cohen noted this can be a big driver of costs, both for small-time homeowners and developers, and that’s kind of the point. A big-time developer can absorb those costs, and what has been happening, Cohen said, is that developers will swing for the fences, as it were, and request a lot of variances to get the most profitable project.

He and Deputy Director of Zoning Kathleen Onufer said that by making the zoning fit, mostly, what’s already there, it defangs one of the major arguments put forth by developers: ‘If the surrounding buildings don’t conform to the zoning, why should my project?’

“Because the rules are tighter and enforceable, our goal in the zoning is to encourage a property owner to do renovations and construction to follow these rules,” he said.

The main contention, at least from West Roxbury Neighborhood Council (WRNC) Vice Chair Tony Saroufim, was for parking. He didn’t believe allowing no requirements for new parking spaces for new units was a good idea.

Cohen said the new regulations basically allow all current parking. He pointed out that the current zoning doesn’t count many spaces (like tandem spaces) into the calculations, and that most homes now would be out of compliance with the parking requirements. The new regulations allow for property owners to choose how much parking they provide, and though the permeability requirements don’t allow for any additional impermeable surfaces, grass, gravel and permeable pavers allow for new parking spaces if needed.

Saroufim, along with many other residents, said they felt this wouldn’t help, as they believe developers are always going to ask for more than what’s allowed.

If you give a mouse a cookie, he’s going to want some milk to go with it.

“Once we pass this, what kind of exceptions are going to be made?” asked resident Robert Foster. “I mean there are already exceptions made in the current system, but once these are passed, how much more could the envelope be pressed?”

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The thing is, at least where this has been tried before, that doesn’t seem to be the case. The city enacted Plan Mattapan two years ago, and is using it as a baseline for the new Neighborhood Housing. Cohen said since then there have been nine additional units built as-of-right under the zoning, mostly through basement and attic conversions.

Onufer said Mattapan’s total number of permits average 50 percent allowed and haven’t needed ZBA approval to 90 percent approval since the new zoning was enacted. In fact, most if not all of the big projects in Mattapan proposed since the new zoning was enacted have been in the multi-family, commercial, Squares+Streets-like districts in the new plan – Plan Mattapan appears to maybe have been a test bed for that too – and not in the outlying residential neighborhood districts.

The maximum allowed zoning for D-2 and D-3, the majority districts in the zoning, would be three units. Basically it would allow every dwelling – regardless of current unit counts – to add an ADU, at least, within the current building envelopes. Additional construction seems to be more dependent on each individual lot’s characteristics, but that’s what also seemed to concern Saroufim.

He said he was all for allowing renovations and ADUs. “But to make it three units? That’s going to be a bit of a stretch,” he said. “If it’s an ADU with enough parking and it follows the laws? That’s good. Also the distance between houses, you should be careful with that and how far you go with that.”

One resident said he didn’t believe consensus was going to happen with this zoning, but rather compromise, so that neither party is happy.

“I want more houses, I want more units, and I want more ADUs,” he said.

“Then go to East Boston!” said Saroufim.

“But I want it here!” the resident replied.

“But you can’t!” Saroufim said.

The meeting calmed down after that.

The comment period for Neighborhood Housing will be open until Oct. 31, and more meetings are scheduled. Cohen asked residents to look at the map and submit comments, especially if you feel the department got a district wrong.

For all maps, district information, and to comment, go to https://gvimes.link/nhbrhdzng