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Represents the overlay zoning districts in Middlesex County. Overlay zoning is a regulatory tool that creates a special zoning district, placed over an existing base zone(s), which identifies special provisions in addition to those in the underlying base zone. Additional regulations or insentives are included with overlay zones to either protect certain resources (environmental or historical), attempt to influence development in certain areas, or offer development options to land owners.The layer was initially created using heads up zoning techniques. MCOP staff attempted to interpret paper zoning maps from the municipalities, using NJDOT road layers, aerial photography, and the NJDEP stream midpoint layers as guides. In March and April 2012 the county neared completion of the countywide tax parcel layer, and so a systematic overhaul of the zoning layer was undertaken to substantially improve the accuracy of the linework. Corecting the lines was undertaken by attempting to snap the old linework to the parcel layer using a cut and merge technique. In addition to the above efforts, MCOP staff has attempted to maintain the layer in an ongoing fashion to reflect densities represented in new zoning ordinances and redevelopment areas. This has required some interpretation of plans on the part of staff members. In 2017, base zoning was seperated from base zoning and placed in a seperate feature class. |