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GlossaryZoningMinnesota law

Comprehensive plan

2 min read
Short answer
A comprehensive plan sets a jurisdiction's long-range policy for land use, housing, transportation and public facilities. Zoning implements it. In the seven-county Twin Cities metropolitan area, comprehensive plans are prepared on a schedule under the Metropolitan Land Planning Act and reviewed by the Metropolitan Council.

A comprehensive plan is a local government's long-range policy document for how land should be used and how the community should develop.

Zoning is the regulation. The comprehensive plan is the intention behind it.

What it contains#

A future land use map, showing what each area is guided for — which is frequently different from what it is zoned for today.

Policies on housing, transportation, parks and open space, water resources and public facilities.

Growth staging — where and when the jurisdiction expects development to occur, and where services will be extended.

Policy, not regulation — with one important qualification#

A comprehensive plan does not by itself control what an owner may do. Zoning does that.

But it is not merely aspirational. Land use decisions are expected to be consistent with the plan, and in the seven-county Twin Cities metropolitan area the Metropolitan Land Planning Act requires plans on a set cycle, reviewed by the Metropolitan Council, with zoning required to conform to the adopted plan.

That makes the plan considerably more consequential in the metro than the word "plan" suggests.

Why it matters to a property owner#

It predicts rezoning. Land guided for future residential use is likely to be rezoned that way as development reaches it. That is information about value before it is information about regulation.

It shapes what permits are available now. Where a proposed use is inconsistent with the long-term plan, a jurisdiction is more likely to offer an interim use permit — temporary, ending on a date or an event — than a conditional use permit that would run indefinitely.

It affects the case for a rezoning. An application consistent with the guided land use is a materially easier argument than one contradicting it.

Reading it for a specific parcel#

Start with the future land use map. It gives the guidance for the parcel in a single step.

Then read the growth staging, if the jurisdiction has it — whether the area is expected to develop in the next five years or the next twenty changes what is realistic now.

Then compare the guidance to the current zoning. A gap between them is where the interesting questions are: land zoned agricultural and guided residential is land in transition, and that transition is where value changes.

Where it connects to distressed property#

Rural parcels on the edge of growth, and tax-forfeited land in areas the county is guiding for a particular purpose, are both cases where the plan tells you something the zoning does not.

A forfeited parcel guided for public open space is unlikely to be sold for development, whatever its current zoning permits. That is knowable before a county land sale, from a document the county publishes.

Common questions

Is a comprehensive plan legally binding?
It is policy rather than regulation — zoning is the regulation. But it matters: rezonings and land use decisions are expected to be consistent with it, and in the metropolitan area zoning must conform to the adopted plan.
How does it affect my property?
It signals what the jurisdiction expects the area to become. Land guided for future residential development is likely to be rezoned that way eventually, which affects value and affects whether an interim use permit rather than a conditional use permit is appropriate now.
Where do I find it?
On the city or county website. Most Minnesota jurisdictions publish both the plan and the future land use map, and the map is usually the most useful page for a specific parcel.
Keep reading
Zoning
Municipal regulation dividing land into districts and controlling what may be built and how property may be used within each.
Zoning district
A mapped area within a jurisdiction subject to a specific set of permitted uses and dimensional requirements.
Interim use permit
A Minnesota permit allowing a temporary use of property until a set date, a stated event, or until the zoning no longer permits it.