TMRPA

The following terms are derived from the 2002 Truckee Meadows Regional Plan and are used in relation to regional planning in Washoe County, Nevada.

Affected Entity
- A public utility, franchise holder, local or regional agency, or any other entity having responsibility for planning or providing public facilities relating to transportation, solid waste, energy generation and transmission, conventions and the promotion of tourism, air quality or public education. Does not include a state agency or a public utility that is subject to regulation by the public utilities commission of Nevada. (NRS 278.026)

Affordable housing
- Housing for a family with a total gross income less than 110 percent of the median gross income for the County concerned based upon the estimates of the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development of the most current median gross family income for the County. (NRS 278.0105)

Agriculture
- The use of land for agricultural purposes, including farming, dairying, pasturage agriculture, horticulture, floriculture, viticulture, and animal and poultry husbandry, and the necessary accessory uses for storing the products.

Air Quality Management Plan
- A detailed description of the programs a state will use to carry out its responsibilities under the federal Clean Air Act. The plan is a collection of reports and regulations used by an area to reduce air pollution. Also known as a State Implementation Plan (SIP), the Environmental Protection Agency must approve the document.

Amendment
- Any repeal, modification or addition to a goal, policy, or procedure, new goal, policy or procedure, any change in the number, shape, boundary or area or any repeal or modification of any map, part thereof or addition thereto.

Annexation
- The process used by a municipality to add surrounding fringe areas to the City or town.

Annual reporting
- A means by which Local Governments and Affected Entities submit material and data on an annual basis with regards to information contained in the Regional Plan.

Archeological resources
- Any material of past human life, activities, or habitation that are of historic or prehistoric significance. Such material includes, but is not limited to, pottery, basketry, bottles, weapon projectiles, tools, structures, pit house, rock paintings, rock carving, intaglios, graves, skeletal remains, personal items and clothing, household or business refuse, printed matter, manufactured items, or any piece of the foregoing items.

Assisted living facilities
- A living arrangement in which people with special needs, especially seniors with disabilities, reside in a facility that provides help with everyday tasks such as bathing, dressing, and taking medication.

Boundary
- A line which may or may not follow a visible feature that defines the limits of a geographic entity such as a block, block numbering area, census tract, County, or place.

Bureau of Land Management
- An agency within the U.S. Department of the Interior, which administers 264 million acres of America's public lands, located primarily in 12 Western States. The BLM sustains the health, diversity, and productivity of the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.

Bureau of Land Management’s Cultural Resource Inventory General Guidelines
- A document, which acts as a set of guidelines for instructions for conducting cultural resource inventories on BLM lands, or lands affected by BLM actions, within the state of Nevada.

Capital Improvements Program
- A plan for capital expenditures to be incurred each year over a fixed period of several years setting forth each capital project, identifying the expected beginning and ending date for each project, the amount to be expended in each year, and the method of financing those expenditures.

Census
- A complete enumeration, usually of a population, but also businesses and commercial establishments, farms, governments, and so forth.

Cities’ Areas of Interest
- The area of land beyond the expanded spheres of influence where cities have an interest in specific aspect of County planning as described in the Settlement Agreement in the case of Washoe County and the Sun Valley General Improvement District vs. the Truckee Meadows Regional Planning Governing Board (CV02-03469). These areas are shown on Map 7 of the Truckee Meadows Regional Plan.

Civic Uses
- Any land, building or facility providing a service or function supported and managed by a City, County or State Government.

Community
- A subarea of the County located within the Truckee Meadows Service Area consisting of residential, institutional, and commercial uses sharing a common identity.

Compatible
- Any property, use, or service that is capable of direct association with certain other uses because it is complementary, congruent, or otherwise non-detrimental. Airport noise compatibility may include noise attenuation north of Interstate 80.

Consensus Forecast
- A methodology combining the population/employment forecasts from various reliable sources.

Cooperative Planning Area
- Areas within the Truckee Meadows where more than one jurisdiction has an interest in the density, intensity or character of development as described in the Settlement agreement in the case of Washoe County and the Sun Valley General Improvement District vs. the Truckee Meadows Regional Planning Governing Board (CV02-03469). These areas are shown on Map 7 of the Truckee Meadows Regional Plan.

Core Area
- The area within the Truckee Meadows area consisting of the two downtowns, other designated Regional Centers, and the transportation links among them. The core areas are characterized by a vital mix of uses, including parks and civic uses, with a high priority on pedestrian activity, and well-served by public transit.

Cultural resources
- Those resources that possess qualities of significance in American, Nevada, or Washoe County history, architecture, archaeology, and culture present in districts, sites, structures, and objects that possess integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, congruency, and association.

Density
- The result of dividing the total number of dwelling units on a site by the total site area. For purposes of calculating density, the site area shall include passive open space with legal public access, and shall not include any of the following a) non-residential, mixed use and public facility properties; 2) property in the Development Constraints Area; 3) property outside the Truckee Meadows Service Areas; 4) Federal wetlands; 5) golf courses; 6) parks; and 7) street and rail rights-of-way.

Development
- Any building, construction, renovation, mining, extraction, dredging, filling, excavation, or drilling activity or operation; any material change in the use or appearance of any structure or in the land itself; the division of land into parcels; any change in the intensity or use of land, such as in increase in the number of dwelling units in a structure or a change to a commercial or industrial use from a less intensive use; any activity that alters a shore, beach, seacoast, river, stream, lake, pond, canal, marsh, dune area, woodlands, wetland, endangered species habitat, aquifer or other resource area, including coastal construction or other activity.

Development Constraints Area
- Area consisting of playa, significant water bodies, natural slopes over 30%, publicly owned open space and properties that are deed restricted to prevent development, but not including constrained lands less than 1/3 acre in size. See Map 4.

Diverse
- Difference among otherwise similar elements that give them unique forms and qualities.

Downtown Centers
- Mixed-use areas that contain developments, services and facilities that provide the primary social, cultural, civic and economic focal points of the region. The Downtown Centers will contain high-density residential developments and will have the highest level and range of activities in the region including shopping, recreation, dining and entertainment, gaming and accommodation, employment and education, cultural or community events and public services and facilities. Downtown Centers will be multi-modal and/or transit hubs and be sited along automobile or transit corridors.

Dwelling
- A building or part of a building, containing living, sleeping, housekeeping accommodations, and sanitary facilities for occupancy by one or more families.

Economy
- Management of the resources of a community or business.

Educational infrastructure
- Facilities and services which serve to provide educational instruction to students.

Emerging Employment Centers
- Areas to be identified in Local Government Master Plans where rapid employment growth is currently occurring or planned, and areas where jobs centers are needed to provide a jobs/housing balance within the region.

Environment
- The physical conditions which exist within the area that will be affected by a proposed project, including land, air, water, mineral, flora, fauna, noise, and objects of historic or aesthetic significance.

Ethnic
- Of or pertaining to a religious, racial, national, or cultural group.

Expanded Sphere of Influence
- The area of land contained within the City of Reno and the City of Sparks sphere of influence, as amended, but on including any lands contained within a city’s sphere of influence prior to May 9, 2002.

Facility Plans
- A plan for the development of public facilities that will have a regional impact or aide in accomplishing regional goals relating to transportation, solid waste, energy generation and transmission, conventions and the promotion of tourism, air quality or public education. The term does not include a plan for the development of a specific site or regulations adopted by an Affected Entity to implement the Regional Plan. Also “Facilities Plan”. See subsection 2 of NRS 278.026.

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
- An independent commission that regulates the transmission of oil and natural gas, the transmission and wholesale sale of electricity, and the licensing of hydroelectric companies.

Forecasts
- The most probable of a set of projections to happen.

Fundamental Assumptions
- A series of points thought to be taken as true without proof or demonstration constituting or functioning as an essential component of the Truckee Meadows Regional Plan.

Gaming sector
- Those activities pertaining to a full range of gaming activities including, for example; race and sports betting, lotteries, casinos, community gaming (eg. "housie"), non-casino gaming machines, Internet and cross-border gaming.

Geographic area
- The primary focus of the Truckee Meadows Regional Plan which includes the southern 15% of Washoe County, with a northern boundary at T.22N. Excluded from this region are the lands administered by the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency and the Tribal Lands.

Goal
- A desired state of affairs to which planned effort is directed.

Governing body
- The City council or other legislative body of the City or the board of County commissioners or, in the case of Carson City, the board of supervisors. (NRS 278.015)

Green space
- Properties with free and legal access that function as recreational areas/corridors and are not designated as primary motor vehicle circulation routes (i.e. road rights of ways). Green spaces may or may not have buildings or other improvements on them. Green spaces include open spaces, parks, bicycle or pedestrian paths, public facilities and utility or other corridors that also allow public access.

Growth
- An increase in size, number, value or strength.

Housing products
- The broad range of styles and types of residences or dwelling places for people.

Human scale development
- Development designed to create and sustain a pleasant and efficient environment for pedestrians, through the utilization of such features as ample sidewalks; short walking distances; choices of pedestrian routes; continuity of pedestrian routes; provisions of amenities for pedestrians; restrained scale of lots, blocks, buildings, setbacks, signage, street widths, parking areas and commercial and residential clusters; fine-grained mixed uses; eye-level architectural detail and access by multiple transportation modes.

Implementation
- Actions, procedures, program, or techniques that carry out policies.

Incorporated City
- Areas/neighborhoods organized for the purpose of self-government. Reno and Sparks are the only incorporated cities in Washoe County.

Industrial development
- A business use or activity at a scale greater than home industry involving manufacturing, fabrication, assembly, warehousing, and/or storage.

Industry sector
- A distinct part of division which pertains to the manufacture, fabrication, processing, reduction, or destruction of any article, substance or commodity, or any treatment thereof in such a manager as to change the form, character, or appearance thereof, and includes storage elevators, truck storage yards, warehousing, wholesale storage, and other similar types of enterprise.

Infill
- Development or redevelopment of land that has been by passed, remained vacant, and/or is underused as a result of the continuing urban development process. Generally, the areas and/or sites are not particularly of prime quality, however they are usually served by or are readily accessible to the infrastructure.

Infrastructure
- The basic facilities such as roads, schools, power plants, transmission lines, transportation, and communication systems on which the continuance and growth of a community depends.

Intensity
- Any ratio that assesses the relative level of activity of a land use, including, but not limited to, a floor area ratio, building coverage ratio, or impervious surface ratio.

Jurisdictions
- Any governmental unit or political division or subdivision including, but not limited to city, County, state, district, or territory over which the governmental unit exercises power and authority.

Land use
- The primary or primary and secondary uses of land such as single family residential, multiple-family residential, commercial, industrial or agriculture. The description of a particular land use should convey the dominant character of a geographic area and thereby establish the types of activities which are appropriate and compatible with primary uses.

Land stock
- An inventory of the quantity of land available for use.

Lot
- A distinct part or parcel of land that has been subdivided to transfer ownership or to build. The term does not include a parcel of land used or intended solely for use as a location for a water well. (NRS 278.0165)

Master plan
- A comprehensive long-term general plan for the physical development of the city, County, or region which includes analysis, recommendation, and proposals for the geographic area it covers.

Minority
- A racial, religious, political, national, or other group regarded as different from the larger group of which it is part.

Mixed-use development
- A single building or land containing more than one type of land use or single development of more than one building and use, where the different types of land uses are in close proximity, planned as a unified complementary whole, and functionally integrated to the use of shared vehicular and pedestrian access and parking areas.

Multi-family
- A detached building designed and used exclusively as a dwelling by three or more families occupying separate suites.

Multi-modal
- Any and all forms of transportation including but not limited to walking, bicycling, transit services, automobile, and rail systems.

Municipal services
- Services traditionally provided by Local Government and/or Affected Entities, including water and sewer, roads, parks, schools and public safety.

National Ambient Air Quality Standards
- A set of standards published by the U.S. EPA in Title 40 of the code of Federal Regulations Subpart 50 that define the levels of air quality necessary to protect human health. The standards apply to the following pollutants Carbon Monoxide, Ozone, Nitrogen Dioxide, Sulfur Dioxide, Particulate Matter, and Lead.

Natural resource
- As used in Policies 4.1.3 and 4.3.6, natural resource means air quality; quality and quantity of surface water and groundwater; habitat for fish, vegetation, and wildlife; open space; flood plains; wetlands; aquifer recharge areas; stream channels; soils; scenic quality; and energy sources.

Neighborhood
- An area of a community with characteristics that distinguish it from other community areas and that may include schools, or social clubs, or boundaries defined by physical barriers, such as major highways and railroads, or natural features, such as rivers.

Nevada Department of Transportation
- A governmental agency of Nevada that serves to efficiently plan, design, construct and maintain a safe and effective transportation system for Nevada's economic, environmental, social and intermodal needs.

Open space
- Properties with free and legal public access that are generally in a natural state. Open space may include spaces that are inappropriate for access or development for any reason such as sensitive environments or hazardous areas (eg landslide areas). Open spaces provide native plant and wildlife habitat, passive recreational opportunities, enhance the scenic character of the region and allow for preservation of significant cultural and archaeological resources.

Pedestrian access and amenities
- Include, but are not limited to, adequate sidewalks (width and connectivity), plazas, frequent crosswalks, on-demand crosswalk signals, wheelchair accessibility, covered shelters, publicly accessible restrooms, public art, benches, public telephones, landscaping, trash facilities and public spaces such as small parks.

Pedestrian friendly
- Pedestrian friendly features are designed to promote increased walking, street life, and transit ridership. Pedestrian friendly features such as wide, continuous sidewalks, bulb-outs at intersections, shorter crossing distance and signal cycles, mid-block crosswalks, tight radii curb returns, and closely spaced transit access encourage pedestrian use and enhance transit ridership.

Plan
- A document, adopted by an agency, that contains, in text, maps, and/or graphics, a method of proceeding, based on analysis and the application of foresight, to guide, direct, or constrain subsequent actions, in order to achieve goals. A plan may contain goals, policies, guidelines, and standards.

Playa
- Generally a dry or intermittently dry lakebed in the lowest spot of a closed valley. Salt contents are generally quite high.

Point source
- Any discernible, confined and discrete conveyance, including but not limited to any pipe, ditch, channel, tunnel, conduit, well, discrete fissure, container, rolling stock, concentrated animal feeding operation, or vessel or other floating craft, from which pollutants are or may be discharged. The term does not include return flows from irrigated agriculture. (NRS 445A.395)

Policy
- A specific statement of principle or of guiding actions that implies clear commitment. A general direction that a governmental agency sets to follow in order to meet its goals and objectives.

Power generation facilities
- Any facility owned and operated by a public or private utility company or independent power producer for the purpose of generating electric power for distribution through the local electric distribution network or for sale to electric transmission companies.

Preservation
- To keep in perfect or unaltered condition; maintain unchanged.

Projections
- A statement about the future based upon the past.

Promote
- To contribute to the progress of or growth of; further.

Public access
- A means of physical approach to, along, and into lands available to the general public.

Public facilities
- A use conducted by, or a facility or structure owned or managed by, a publicly funded entity that provides a governmental function, activity or service for public benefit.

Public lands
- Any land area owned and managed by a public entity for the public good.

Public Utilities Commission
- A commission which strives to see that sellers of utility services regulated by the Commission are provided fair and impartial regulation; customers of competitive utility services receive safe, economic, efficient, accessible and reliable services; and, sellers of competitive utility services are free to compete for customers in a market void of regulatory barriers to enter.

Quarries
- A lot of land or part thereof used for the purpose of extracting stone, sand, gravel, or top soil for sale and exclusive of the process of grading a lot preparatory to the construction of a building for which application for a building permit has been made.

Ranchettes
- A single dwelling unit occupied by a non-farming household on a parcel of 2.5 to 20 acres that has been subdivided for limited use.

Recommendations
- Preferred courses of action which assist in the achievement of goals. Recommendations are planning, land use, and general government-related activities that can be pursued, ideally as a whole, to help the community meet its goals and thresholds.

Region
- An area located in southern Washoe County, south of Township 22 north, excluding the Tahoe Regional Planning Area and Tribal lands.

Regional Centers
- Mixed-use areas that contain developments, services and facilities that provide a regional benefit. Regional Centers will have a primary specialized focus and will be substantially self-contained. Regional Centers may contain high-density residential developments and will have a high level and range of activities including shopping, recreation, dining and entertainment, gaming and accommodation, employment and education, cultural or community events and public services and facilities. Regional Centers will include a high level of pedestrian activity. Regional Centers will be multi-modal and/or transit hubs and be sited along automobile or transit corridors.

Regional Open Space Plan
- A plan created pursuant to NRS 376A.020, which directs Washoe County to develop and coordinate a Regional Open Space Program to include major open space areas that will link these areas with trails or open space corridors.

Regional Planning Commission
- The RPC has nine members, including three each from the Reno, Sparks, and Washoe County local planning commissions, appointed by their respective governing bodies. (NRS 278.0262)

Regional Planning Governing Board
- The RPGB consists of ten members including three from the Washoe County Commission, four from the Reno City Council, and three from the Sparks City Council. (NRS 278.0264)

Regional Transportation Commission
- The Regional Transportation Commission is the designated Metropolitan Planning Organization for Washoe County and is responsible under the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century for developing the Regional Transportation Plan.

Regional Transportation Plan
- The 2030 RTP serves as the region’s long-range transportation plan to accommodate the Regional Form and land-use, master-planned development in the City of Reno, City of Sparks and Washoe County.

Regional Water Management Plan
- document which provides the region with an outline of how water will be managed to meet the needs of the citizens into the future. Major components of the plan are identification of future water supply and wastewater facilities, regional flood control and drainage projects, and development of a conservation program. Serves the area generally described as all lands within Washoe County south of Township 25, excluding the Lake Tahoe watershed, Pyramid Lake Paiute Indian Reservation, and other tribal trust lands within the planning areas.

Regional Water Planning Commission
- Body of individuals from the local jurisdictions set up by legislation responsible for developing and maintaining the Regional Water Plan.

Regulation
- A rule or order prescribed for management by government.

Resort destination
- A resort facility or development of multiple buildings intended primarily for transient guests where the primary attraction is generally recreational facilities or activities, including, but not limited to snow sports and activities (i.e., ski area residential uses shall be primarily “ski-in/ski-out”), golf, dude and guest ranches, health spas and resorts, backcountry adventures, hunting, fishing, and water sports. A resort destination is generally located in a setting of significant natural amenities, and may include a range of on-site indoor or outdoor recreation facilities.

Resort destination element
- An element of the local master plan that addresses Regional Plan Policy 1.1.15 and related policies regarding the establishment of destination resorts, within the Rural Development Area, north of T24N.

Resort Service Area
- An area inside the Rural Development Area, south of T25N and outside the Truckee Meadows Service Areas, where local government master plans may allow for the development of resort destinations.

Right-of-way
- A strip of land acquired by reservation, dedication, prescription, or condemnation and intended to be occupied by a street, trail, water line, sanitary sewer, and/or other public utilities or facilities.

Road
- All property dedicated or intended for public or private road, street, alley, highway, freeway, or roadway purposes or to public easements therefore.

RTC’s Primary Transit Network
- The Primary Transit Network is intended to improve the appeal of public transportation to a diverse group of riders, to reduce individual automobile trips, and to provide the lowest cost to riders by achieving maximum productivity. The PTN includes concepts such as Bus Rapid Transit, conversion of Prater Way and Virginia Street to transit corridors with exclusive transit travel lanes, retrofitting of signals on Virginia Street to add queue jumping capabilities to improve transit reliability, and other improvements to support and encourage transit ridership.

Rural Development Area
- Area within the region lying outside the Truckee Meadows Service Areas.

Secretary of Interior’s Standards for Archeology and Historic Preservation
- A document which provides technical advice about archaeological and historic preservation activities and methods. It includes identification, evaluation, documentation, registration, and treatment of historic properties.

Shall
- Mandatory to carry out the policy, even if a timeframe is not included. Meaning imperative and non-discretionary. Subject to funding and budgetary constraints, which may not allow for implementation of the policy and subject to provisions of the annual budget.

Significant ridgelines
- Ridgelines that surround or visually dominate the valley landscape either through their size in relation to the hillside or mountain terrain or which they are a part; their visual dominance as characterized by a silhouetting appearance against the sky; as a significant backdrop feature or separation of communities; through visual dominance due to proximity and view from existing development or major corridors; or as an area of significant ecological, historical or cultural importance such as those which connect park or trail systems.

Sphere of Influence
- An area into which a City plans to expand as designated in a comprehensive Regional Plan adopted pursuant to NRS 278.026 to 278.029, inclusive, within the time designated in the comprehensive regional plan. (NRS 268.623)

Sprawl
- Premature growth or outward expansion of development. Low-density land-use patterns that are automobile-dependent, energy and land consumptive, and require a very high ratio of road surface to development served.

Stakeholder
- Individuals and/or groups which have a share or interest in an enterprise.

Streets
- Open and public throughfares including streets, avenues, boulevards, roads, lanes, alleys, viaducts, public easements and right of way, and other ways. (NRS 278.018)

Suburban
- Suburban development includes residential uses at generally one to three single family units per acre and supportive nonresidential and public development.

Tentative map
- A map made to show the design of a proposed subdivision and the existing conditions in and around it. (NRS 278.019)

Transit hub
- A transit hub is a central transportation facility capable of accommodating multiple modes of transportation. A transit hub in Reno could include Citi-Center, a Greyhound Bus Terminal, an Amtrak Depot, accommodation for taxi’s and tour busses, and perhaps a parking structure and retail shops.

Transit-oriented development (TOD)
- Moderate and high-density housing concentrated in mixed-use developments located along transit routes. The location, design, and mix of uses in a TOD emphasize pedestrian-oriented environments and encourages the use of public transportation.

Transit Oriented Development (TOD) Corridor
- Corridors depicted on Map 5 of the Regional Plan, generally ¼ mile wide on each side of the designated transportation route or road, as further defined in Local Government Master Plans.

Transit stations
- Provide the interface between pedestrians and the transit service and will include consistent design within TOD Corridors and at a minimum will include seating capacity and signage. The establishment of stations acknowledges that future progression of transit services (i.e. bus to bus rapid transit, to light rail, etc.) is an option that the community may wish to pursue in the future.

Transportation System Management
- Includes, but not limited to, signal coordination and prioritization, queue jumping at all signal intersections, wide sidewalks, bike lanes and designated High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes.

Truckee Meadows Regional Plan
- A comprehensive Regional Plan for the physical development and orderly management of the growth of the region for the next 20 years.

Truckee Meadows Service Areas (TMSA)
- The defined areas within which municipal services and infrastructure will be provided. This area includes the high intensity core areas and existing and planned urban and suburban uses.

Unincorporated Areas
- Areas outside any city and under the County’s jurisdiction.

Unincorporated Communities
- Management units that may be designated in the Washoe County Comprehensive Plan in unincorporated areas within the TMSA and outside the two cities and their Spheres of Influence.

Urban development
- Development occurring at an intensity greater than 3 dwelling units per acre that is served by community water and sewer.

Urban growth
- Development that makes intensive use of land for the location of buildings, other structures, and impermeable surfaces to such a degree as to be incompatible with the primary use of such land for the production of food, fiber, or other agricultural products, or the extraction of mineral resources and that, when allowed to spread over wide areas, typically requires municipal services.

Utilities
- All lines and facilities related to the provision, distribution, collection, transmission, or disposal of water, storm and sanitary sewage, oil, gas, power, information, telecommunication and telephone cable, and includes facilities for the generation of electricity.

Utility Corridor
- “Utility Corridor”means the space occupied by and immediately adjacent to Electric transmission lines carrying 60 kilovolts or more; natural gas mains operating at over 100 pounds per square inch; and their appurtenant structures.

Utility Corridor Plan
- The plan and/or map describing the location and nature of utility corridors, as defined in the 1999 Regional Utility Corridor Report, and as modified by subsequent amendment or action related to that report.

Viewshed
- The area within view from a defined observation point.

Vision Statement
- A statement that defines a community’s preferred future.

Water bodies
- Areas that include lakes, playas, rivers, streams and federally designated wetlands and floodways.

Watershed
- All lands enclosed by a continuous hydrologic drainage divide and lying upslope from a specified point on a stream. Also referred to as water basin. A ridge of relatively high land dividing two areas that are drained by different river systems.

Water System Facility Plans
- A plan that describes service area and pressure zone boundaries, facilities necessary to serve developments within these boundaries and the location and timing of the necessary facility improvements.

Wetland
- Those areas that are inundated and saturated by surface or groundwater at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support a prevalence of vegetation typically adapted for life in saturated soil conditions, including swamps, marches, bogs, and similar areas.