Downtown Master Plan Update

Over a one-year planning process, the City of West Palm Beach together with the recently selected firm of Zyscovich Architects will prepare a comprehensive update to the West Palm Beach Downtown Master Plan (DMPU) that creates a forward looking vision for Downtown: a well-defined future vision for Downtown  West Palm Beach ensuring its sustainability and success for future generations while also considering  and evaluating the past planning efforts and studies. 

The DMPU will set a vision for Downtown West Palm Beach for the next 25 years where residents live in vibrant neighborhoods, are able to participate in the city’s economic growth, and where significant resources including the waterfront can thrive. While West Palm Beach can be thought about as having distinct types of places, each area will require a customized approach to growth, enhancement and preservation that resolves present conflicts between the public and private realm and is responsive to the existing and varied fabric of the city. 

The development of a comprehensive West Palm Beach Downtown Master Plan Update (DMPU) is an exciting and timely opportunity to embrace forward-thinking solutions in developing a framework to meet the needs of the city past the post-covid landscape.

The City of West Palm Beach (“City”) adopted its first Downtown Master Plan (“DMP”) in 1995 with a 

subsequent update occurring in 2007.  It has been 17 years since the City last reviewed the DMP and, given the explosive growth experienced during the COVID boom period from 2022 to the present, it is an appropriate time to evaluate the policies in place to determine what  changes may now be warranted.  Some of the goals will be to focus on how to continue to retain and attract businesses, residents, and visitors to the downtown and how to create a sustainable environment with further enhancement of the public realm to make the downtown a diverse area with opportunities for housing, business, entertainment, education, culture, health, and recreation. 

The 1995 original DMP was prepared with the assistance of the consultant firm of DPZ (Elizabeth 

Plater-Zyberk and Andres Duany) and adopted by the City Commission in December 1995, with the 

intent to provide a 24-hour, live, work, play environment for the City.  The goals of the DMP were to 

provide a unified vision of a downtown inspiring confidence and encouraging new development, 

without waiting for the next real estate boom.  With this goal, the plan promoted a vision of: 

1. A place of unity, which its residents and visitors, at work or play, feel attached to and responsible for; 

2. A place of unique character with public spaces in which people feel comfortable together;

3. A place of common vision and physical predictability for all new development, to ensure  security of investment for property owners and developers as  well as an aesthetic experience  for users;

4. A memorable place of human interaction, safety, and commercial and cultural benefit. 

Since the adoption of the original DMP, the City has experienced profound changes in the character 

and scale of development downtown. A significant number of residential projects were built creating 

conflicts between the private and public realm and an emphasis was made to reevaluate the DMP in 

terms of land use, traffic, parks and open spaces, and community services. 

The firm of Bernard Zyscovich was selected to complete the subsequent update and a new DMP was 

adopted in 2007.  The firm’s charge was to evaluate existing and future land uses and test existing 

and future rezoning standards to provide a regulatory framework compatible with the downtown’s 

current and future development patterns.  This new plan created districts and subdistricts, street 

classifications as well as a mechanism to transfer development rights from one parcel to another.  

The DMPU calls for seizing a generational opportunity to re-envision the City’s downtown into a new resilient, healthy and successful district that meets the City’s established goals to:

• Attract and retain high quality jobs and industry. 

• Enhance the quality of life of its residents. 

• Define mobility infrastructure options and smart technologies to encourage efficiency of pedestrian movement and connectivity. 

• Enhance the public realm while defining climate resilience design recommendations. 

• Activate and connect the downtown to the waterfront. 

• Protect historic structures and neighborhoods to retain the cultural heritage of the city.