Developers who don't like Fayetteville's new, more restrictive building standards have a way around them. They can redevelop an existing facility.

City Council recently approved broad changes to the city's zoning and development ordinances that tighten the city's limit on paved surfaces.

Until now, developments could cover up to 75 percent of a parcel with buildings and parking lots, but under the changes adopted Monday they can cover only 60 percent. The rest has to be landscaped.

The law is designed to reduce the storm water runoff from buildings and parking lots, allowing more rain water to soak into the soil.

But developers who want to restore or redevelop existing shopping centers and office buildings are given a break. They can replace all of the existing pavement. In some of Fayetteville's older developments, built before the city began enforcing such standards, paving and buildings cover as much as 80 to 90 percent of the land area, said planning and zoning director Jahnee Prince.

"This will be a great incentive for them to come in and redevelop some of the older areas," she said.

That's not an alarming percentage of the city's overall commercial area, about 6.5 percent, said Prince, but it's probably more like 15 to 20 percent of the commercial areas closer to downtown.

The ordinances adopted this month also beef up buffers required between different zoning districts, limit parking in yards and on streets, define and regulate bed and breakfast operations, and set up a special set of design standards for major highway corridors in the city.

Council took out of the proposed new laws a provision that would have prohibited parking of large commercial vehicles at a person's residence. After hearing from a resident who brings his commercial truck home for occasional maintenance, council decided that portion of the ordinance needs more study.