Labs Experiment 002
Question 7 lots
Question 7 on the November 3 ballot would bar zoning from blocking a single-family home on any lot with at least 5,000 square feet and 50 feet of street frontage where there’s public water and sewer (H.5000). A lot with twice that, 10,000 square feet and 100 feet of frontage, could be divided into two lots that each qualify.
The map marks the Arlington lots that clear that bar in the residential districts where the measure would lower today’s minimums. Dark blue lots couldn’t be divided under today’s rules; light blue lots already could. Tap a lot for its numbers or search for an address.
Sources and limits
- What Question 7 does. The measure (H.5000) bars zoning from prohibiting a single-family home “in a zoning district that allows residential uses” on any lot with at least 5,000 square feet, 50 feet of frontage, and public sewer and water. Plain-language summary: Boston.com.
- Which lots. The map marks lots with at least 10,000 square feet and an estimated 100 feet of frontage. Only taxable lots that aren’t condominiums are shown, in the residential districts where today’s single-family minimums are larger than the measure’s: R0, R1, R2, R4, R5 and R7. R3 and R6 already allow 5,000 square feet and 45 feet, so the measure changes nothing there. Planned unit development (PUD) land is left out, and so is 0 Lot Concord Turnpike, taken to be the parcel Article 50 moved to R6.
- Today’s minimums for a single-family lot, from the zoning bylaw: 9,000 square feet and 75 feet in R0; 6,000 square feet and 60 feet in R1, R2, R4 and R5; and 20,000 square feet and 100 feet in R7. Lots with twice those are shown light blue, as already able to be divided.
- Business districts don’t allow single-family homes under the zoning bylaw and aren’t shown, though the measure covers any district that allows residential uses, so it could arguably reach them too.
- Lot size comes from the town’s Parcels with Assessor Info layer, fiscal year 2026.
- Frontage is estimated. The assessor data has no frontage, so it’s measured from each parcel’s outline against the town’s street centerlines: the stretch of its edge that faces a street and doesn’t touch another parcel. Edges that run off past the end of a street don’t count. A corner or through lot counts if it has at least 50 feet on each of two streets, since it could be divided into one lot facing each. Lots near 100 feet can be off by several feet either way.
- Meeting the numbers doesn’t make a lot divisible. Where the existing house sits, setbacks, lot shape, wetlands and Planning Board rules all decide that.
- Recent zoning changes aren’t shown yet. The 2026 Town Meeting map changes (Articles 50 and 52), effective October 1, aren’t in the town’s parcel data yet.
- Last rebuilt from the town’s data: loading…