(a)

It is the general intent of this chapter to regulate and restrict the use and development of all structures, lands, and waters; to regulate and restrict lot coverage, population distribution and density, tree cutting, dredging, and lagooning in shoreland areas and the size and location of all structures, so as to:

(1)

Lessen congestion in, and promote the safety and efficiency of the streets and highways;

(2)

Secure safety from fire, flooding, panic, and other dangers;

(3)

Provide adequate light and air;

(4)

Prevent overcrowding;

(5)

Avoid undue population concentration;

(6)

Facilitate the adequate provision of public facilities and utilities; stabilize and protect property values;

(7)

Prevent water pollution;

(8)

Protect spawning grounds, fish and aquatic life and otherwise further the appropriate use of land and conservation of natural resources;

(9)

Preserve and promote the beauty of the city;

(10)

Implement the city's comprehensive plan and plan components; and

(11)

Provide for the administration and enforcement of this chapter and to provide penalties for its violation.

(b)

The provisions of this chapter shall be held to be minimum requirements adopted to promote the health, safety, morals, comfort, prosperity, and general welfare of the city.

(Prior Code, §§ 17.01, 17.02)

The following words, terms and phrases, when used in this chapter, shall have the meanings ascribed to them in this section, except where the context clearly indicates a different meaning:

Accessory building or structure.

(1)

The term "accessory building or structure" means a building or portion of a building subordinate to the main building or structure and used for a purpose customarily incidental to the permitted use of the main building or structure or the use of the premises, including, but not limited to, garages, prefabricated metal buildings for storage, carports, greenhouses, screened enclosures, swimming pools, bathhouse and filter equipment sheds, playhouses, gazebos, satellite dish antennas, and open storage.

(2)

Accessory buildings shall not occupy more than 27 percent of the total lot area. Any accessory building projected forward of the rear building line of the principal building shall satisfy the same front and side yard requirements as the principal building.

Alley means a street or thoroughfare less than 21 feet wide and affording only secondary access to abutting property.

Bed and breakfast means any place of lodging that provides four or fewer rooms for more than ten nights in a 12-month period, is the owner's personal residence, is occupied by the owner at the time of rental, and in which the only meal served to guests is breakfast.

Building means any structure used, designed or intended for the protection, shelter, enclosure, or support of persons, animals, or property. When a building is divided into separate parts by unpierced walls extending from the ground up, each part shall be deemed a separate building. A carport shall be considered a building.

Building height means the vertical distance from the average curb level in front of the lot or the finished grade at the building line, whenever is higher, to the highest point of the coping of a flat roof, to the deck line of a mansard roof, or to the average height of the highest gable of a gambrel, hip, or pitch roof.

Campground means a privately or municipally owned parcel or tract of land, maintained, intended or used for the purposes of supplying temporary or overnight living accommodations to the public by providing designated areas for the placement of trailers, tents, buses, automobiles, or sleeping bags, and may include structures to provide services to the patrons, such as restrooms, bathing, and laundry facilities.

Dwelling, multiple-family, means a building or portion thereof designed for and occupied by more than two families, including row houses, apartment houses, and condominiums.

Dwelling, one-family, means a detached building designed for or occupied exclusively by one family.

Dwelling, two-family, means a detached or semi-detached building designed for or occupied exclusively by two families.

Family means any number of persons related by blood, adoption, or marriage, not to exceed four persons not so related, living together in one dwelling as a single housekeeping entity.

Farming means the raising of crops and keeping of farm animals, including, but not limited to, cattle, fowl, rabbits, sheep, goats, and horses.

Feedlot means any livestock feeding or housing area or structure in which the concentration of animals is such that a vegetative cover is not maintained during the summer.

Fences means any barrier constructed of wood, wire, metal, stone, or a combination thereof, excluding single strand or barbed wire fences. Such fences shall not exceed 84 inches in height in the side or rear yard or 48 inches in height in the front yard. In the M district, fences shall not exceed 15 feet in height. All fences in the front yard or a vision triangle shall not exceed 48 inches in height, shall be 90 percent see-through, and shall not obstruct the vision of pedestrians or motorists.

Frontage means all the property abutting on one side of a road or street, between two intersecting roads or streets, or all of the property abutting on one side of a road or street between an intersecting road or street and the dead end of a road or street.

Garage, private, means an accessory building in residential areas for the storage of motor driven vehicles, not exceeding, when combined with any other accessory buildings on the premises, more than 20 percent of the total lot area.

Garage, public, means any building or premises, other than a private or storage garage, where motor-driven vehicles are equipped, repaired, painted, serviced, hired, sold, or stored.

Home occupation means a gainful occupation conducted by members of the family only, within their place of residence; provided:

(1)

That the area used does not exceed 25 percent of the total floor area, excluding attached garage;

(2)

That no article or service sold or offered for sale on the premises except such as is produced by such occupation;

(3)

That no materials used in or produced by the occupation are displayed or stored outside; no stock in trade is kept or sold;

(4)

That no mechanical equipment is used other than such as is permissible for purely domestic purposes;

(5)

That the volume of vehicular or pedestrian traffic or parking shall not result in congestion or be abnormal for a residential neighborhood;

(6)

That no sign other than one unlighted name plate not more than six square feet is installed;

(7)

That no structural alterations that are not customarily part of the dwelling unit are needed; and

(8)

That no person other than a member of the immediate family living on the premises is employed.

Hotel means a building where rooms, with or without meals, are supplied to the transient public, or to anyone who may apply, for compensation.

Junk or salvage yard means an area consisting of buildings, structures, or premises where junk, waste, discarded or salvage materials are bought, sold, exchanged, stored, baled, packed, disassembled, or handled, including automobile wrecking yards, but not including the purchase or storage of used furniture or household equipment or used cars in operable condition.

Kennel means the use of land with related buildings and structures for the breeding, rearing, boarding, or training of more than four dogs or cats over five months of age.

Livestock unit means 1,500 pounds of live animal weight. The term "animals" includes, but is not limited to, cattle, horses, pigs, sheep, and buffalo.

Lot means a parcel of land having frontage or legal access to a public street, occupied, or intended to be occupied by a principal structure or use and sufficient in size to meet the lot width, lot frontage, lot area, yard, parking area, and other open space provisions of this chapter.

Lot, corner, means a lot abutting on two or more streets at their intersection, provided that the interior angle of such intersection is less than 135 degrees.

Lot, depth of, means the mean horizontal distance between the front and rear lot lines.

Lot, through, means an interior lot having frontage on two non-intersecting streets.

Lot lines means the lines bounding a lot as defined herein.

Lot width means the width of a parcel of land measured at the rear of the specified setback lines.

Manufactured home means a structure designed to be used as a dwelling with or without a permanent foundation that is certified by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development as complying with the standards established under 42 USC §§ 5401 to 5425.

Manufactured home lot means a parcel of land in a manufactured home park or community of not less than 5,000 square feet and designed for the placement of one manufactured home.

Manufactured home park or community means any plot or plots of ground upon which three or more manufactured homes that are occupied for dwelling or sleeping purposes are located. The term does not include a farm where the occupants of the manufactured homes are the father, mother, son, daughter, brother or sister of the farm owner or operator or where the occupants of the manufactured homes work on the farm.

Motel means a series of attached, semi-attached, or detached sleeping units for the accommodation of transient guests.

Nonconforming structure means any structure lawfully used, occupied, or erected at the time of the effective date of the ordinance from which this chapter is derived, or amendments thereto, which structurally does not conform to the regulations of this chapter or amendments thereto. Any such structure conforming in respect to use, but not in respect to frontage, width, height, area, yard, parking, loading or distance requirements shall be considered a nonconforming structure and not a nonconforming use.

Nonconforming use means a building or premises lawfully used or occupied at the time of the passage of the ordinance from which this chapter is derived, or amendments thereto, which use or occupancy does not conform to the regulations of this chapter or amendments thereto.

Occupancy means the residing of an individual or individuals overnight in a dwelling unit, or the installation, storage or use of equipment, merchandise or machinery in any public, commercial or industrial building.

Occupant means the individual or individuals in actual possession of a premises.

Parking area means an area other than a street used for the temporary parking of motor vehicles.

Principal use or building means the main use of the land or buildings as distinguished from an incidental and subordinate accessory use of land or buildings.

Professional office means the office of a doctor, surveyor, planner, dentist, minister, architect, landscape architect, professional engineer, lawyer, author, musician or a member of a recognized

profession. When established in a residential district, a professional office shall be incidental to the residential occupation, not more than 25 percent of the floor area excluding the garage, only one story of a dwelling unit shall be occupied by such office, only one nonresident person is employed, and only one unlighted name plate, not exceeding six square feet in area, containing the name and profession of the occupant of the premises shall be exhibited.

Public and semipublic uses means governmental and cultural uses, such as administrative offices, fire, ambulance and police stations, community centers, libraries, public emergency shelters, parks, playgrounds and museums, public, private and parochial preschool, elementary and secondary schools, and churches, cemeteries, private clubs and lodges and public storage garages.

Recreational vehicle means a vehicular unit designed as temporary living quarters for recreational, camping or travel use which either has its own motive power or is mounted on or drawn by another vehicle. The basic entities are: travel trailer, camping trailer, truck camper, or motor home.

Setback means the minimum horizontal distance between the street line and the nearest point of a building or projection thereof, excluding uncovered steps.

Setback lines means lines established along highways and streets at specified distances from the right-of-way line, which buildings or structures shall be set back of, or outside of, and within which they may not be placed except as hereinafter provided. The term "within the setback line" means between the setback lines and the highway or street.

Sign means any identification, description, illustration, or device illuminated or non-illuminated which is visible from any public place or is located on private property and exposed to the public and which directs attention to a product, service, place, activity, person, institution, business or solicitation; including a permanently installed, or situated merchandise or any emblem, painting, banner, pennant, placard, or temporary sign designed to advertise, identify, or convey information with the exception of window displays and flags. For the purpose of removal, signs shall also include all sign structures.

Street means all property dedicated or intended for public street purposes.

Street line means a dividing line between a lot, tract, or parcel of land and a contiguous street.

Story means that portion of a building included between the surface of a floor and the surface of the floor next above it, or, if there be no floor above it, then the space between the floor and the ceiling next above it. A basement or cellar having one-half or more of its height above grade shall be deemed a story for purposes of height regulation.

Story, half, means the space under any roof except a flat roof which, if occupied for residential purposes, shall be counted as a full story.

Structural alterations means any change in the supporting members of a building or any substantial change in the roof structure or in the exterior walls.

Structure means anything constructed or erected which is not readily or usually relocated and moved, the use of which requires a permanent location on the ground or attached to something having a permanent location on the ground.

Swimming pool means a container either temporarily or permanently constructed upon or within the ground so designed as to contain water exceeding 12 inches in depth and having an area greater than 150 square feet which is used primarily for swimming.

Temporary structure means a movable structure not designed for human occupancy nor for the protection of goods or chattels and forming an enclosure.

Traffic lane means a strip of roadway intended to accommodate a single line of moving vehicles.

Yard means an open space on the same lot with or without a structure, unoccupied and unobstructed from the ground upward except for vegetation and as otherwise provided herein. The street and rear yards extend the full width of the lot.

Yard, front, means a yard extending the full width of the lot between the front lot line and the nearest part of the main building, excluding uncovered steps. On a corner lot, the front yard will be the yard with the larger lot width measured at the rear of the specified setback line. The property address shall be designated in the front yard.

Yard, rear, means a yard extending the full width of the lot, being the minimum horizontal distance between the rear lot line and the nearest part of the building, excluding uncovered steps.

Yard, side, means a yard extending from the front yard to the rear yard, being the minimum horizontal distance between a building and side lot line.

(Prior Code, § 17.15)

It is not intended by this chapter to repeal, abrogate, annul, impair, or interfere with any existing easement, covenants or agreements between parties or with any rules, regulations, or permits previously adopted or issued pursuant to laws; provided, however, that where this chapter imposes a greater restriction upon the use of buildings or premises, or upon the height of a building or requires larger open spaces than are required by other rules, regulations or permits or by easements, covenants or agreements, the provisions of this chapter shall govern.

(Prior Code, § 17.03)

The provisions of this chapter shall be interpreted and applied as minimum requirements, shall be liberally construed in favor of the city, and shall not be deemed a limitation of repeal of any other power granted by state law.

(Prior Code, § 17.04)

After majority vote of the plan commission recommending adoption and after public hearing as required by state law, the city council adopted a comprehensive plan for the city entitled "City of Shullsburg Smart Growth Comprehensive Plan."

(Ord. No. 238, 3-24-2004; Ord. No. 320, § 5, 12-1-2022)