Shape Oak Park
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How will proposed zoning changes affect your property? Enter your Oak Park address or PIN to see a side-by-side comparison of existing and proposed zoning standards. You can also share your feedback directly from any property page.
Click here to view recommendations
This document includes recommendations presented to the Board of Trustees on July 28. These recommendations are not final. Village staff and the consultant team will continue refining them based on Trustee feedback and ongoing community engagement. The final zoning changes reflecting these recommendations and additional considerations will be presented to the Plan Commission by Village Planning staff in October.
Project Overview
Shape Oak Park | Village of Oak Park
Oak Park has always been a leader—shaped by generations of residents who understood that great neighborhoods don't just happen, they're created through thoughtful, intentional choices. Today, Oak Park residents choose to live here because they want to thrive in a vibrant community that reflects their values of equity, inclusion, sustainability, and affordability. Our zoning code should support those same commitments.
Through Shape Oak Park, we are:
Inviting you to lead. Your input will actively guide our community's evolution through surveys, conversations, pop-up events, and workshops throughout the year.
Exploring more housing choices. Missing middle housing—duplexes, townhomes, and small-scale buildings that match our neighborhood character—can create opportunities for teachers, families, nurses, seniors, and everyone who wants to call Oak Park home.
Honoring our character. We're proposing gentle, incremental changes—thoughtful additions that preserve what makes Oak Park special while opening doors for young families, older adults, and everyone in between.
Shape Oak Park is about ensuring the next generation can write its own Oak Park story.
What is Zoning & Why Does it Matter?
Think of zoning as the rules that determine what can be built where in our community. These regulations decide whether a lot can have a business, public space or residence. If it is a residence, then the rules will determine whether it is a single-family home, a duplex or a small apartment building. They set requirements for parking, building height and lot coverage. While zoning might sound technical, it directly shapes who can afford to live in Oak Park, what housing choices are available and how our neighborhoods evolve.
Zoning codes don’t always align with their community's current needs, wants or values. That's where this strategic update to key zoning standards comes in—we're refining these rules to create more housing opportunities while preserving Oak Park's cherished character, walkability and scale.
What is Missing Middle Housing?
Missing Middle Housing is a range of buildings with multiple units compatible in scale and form with detached single-family homes and located in existing neighborhoods. These buildings support walkability, locally-serving retail and public transportation options. They provide solutions along a spectrum of affordability to address the mismatch between the available housing stock and shifting demographics combined with the growing demand for walkability.
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Oak Park's tree-lined streets, historic homes, and busy corridors are the place we love. But housing costs are rising, and household needs are changing. Over the last year, we’ve engaged the community and studied current housing conditions in Oak Park to enable more housing, more choice, and greater affordability for everyone.
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Right now, five of Oak Park's eight residential districts only allow single-family homes, even though duplexes and small apartment buildings already exist there as non-conforming uses. Shape Oak Park proposes clearer standards that make it easier for residents, developers, and village staff to figure out what’s actually allowed on any property, while keeping the setbacks and standards that fit each neighborhood.
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Oak Park's corridors are where we shop, eat, and gather, but the zoning rules governing them haven't kept up with what our community actually needs. For the last few decades, housing near transit has grown in demand. Through our engagement, we learned that people are seeking smaller units, the ability to downsize while still being connected to their community, and more foot traffic that helps strengthen the local economy.
Shape Oak Park makes it easier to build housing above and alongside local businesses, with building heights that step down to protect the neighborhoods next door.
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Oak Park's current zoning map has more than a dozen districts with confusing, overlapping rules. Shape Oak Park simplifies that into a cleaner framework: Neighborhood Districts, Mixed-Use Districts, and Downtown Sub-Districts, each with a clear purpose and consistent standards.
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Phone 708-358-5420 Email development@oak-park.us -
Phone 708-358-5440 Email planning@oak-park.us -
Project Consultant
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Project Consultant
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Project Consultant
