David Petersen, AICP
Community Development Director
Farmington City
David Petersen, AICP, has been the Community Development Director for Farmington City since 1994. Mr. Petersen received a Bachelor’s Degree in Business from the University of Utah in 1986 and a Master’s Degree in Planning from the University of Tennessee in 1992. After graduation he worked for the MPO for the City of Wichita Falls, Texas. for 2.5 years. While a student he enjoyed working part time for the cities of Knoxville and Chattanooga. He has an uncommon interest in cities and how they grow and develop. As a kid he looked forward every year to receiving the updated map from the Davis County phone directory to see where the new streets had been built, and he enjoyed riding his bike, and later motorcycle, to check things out. He could often be found wandering the streets of downtown Bountiful near his childhood home to look at historic buildings.
Session(s):
Self-Help Housing for Affordability / Farmington City: ADU’s As a Policy Tool for Homeownership »
2025 APA UT Spring Conference, May 8, 2025 1:15 pmA discussion of the self-help housing program in Utah including the funding mechanisms, land development methods including a master planned community in Smithfield, housing types available, and a full breakdown of the cost to build housing in today's market. Learn about what it takes to run the program and how we help very-low and low-income households afford home ownership. & Accessory Dwelling Units have been traditionally viewed as an option for providing additional rental housing opportunities within a variety of communities. Farmington City is challenging that paradigm with an innovative approach to enable ADUs as an entry point for homeownership. Come learn how!
Not All Stories Are Carved in Stone: Community, History, and Placemaking at Tom Owens Park »
2025 APA UT Spring Conference, May 7, 2025 3:15 pmThis session will introduce the Tom Owens Park project’s vision, emphasizing its focus on recreation, natural preservation, and community history. Attendees will explore key features like sustainable design, adaptive reuse of historic elements, and the Farmington StoryCorps initiative, which captures personal narratives. A Q&A session will foster interactive dialogue, followed by breakout groups to identify historical resources and collaboratively develop restoration ideas aligned with community goals, offering inspiration and practical strategies for real-world applications.
Zoning – Carrot vs. Stick »
2022 Fall Conference, September 9, 2022 10:10 amDecade’s long planning practices show that most zoning ordinances in Utah, and nationwide, include PUD (or PRUD) standards which provide incentives such as increased density in exchange for improved (and unimproved) common area(s), better architectural design, etc., but these standards are often primarily limited to residential development. This session presents additional planning tools to encourage stronger commercial, mixed use, and residential projects to help achieve affordable housing goals, better mixed use, trails, open space, public improvements, and cutting-edge design. Such tools include mechanisms to meter residential development in mixed-use areas, a commercial equivalent to residential PUDs, development agreements, special exceptions as opposed to variances, finer grain density bonuses, increased building height allowances, TDRs, and more. Planners from Farmington City and North Salt Lake will discuss and present examples they have adopted and implemented in their respective communities.
Billboards in Utah—Information for the Local Level »
September 9, 2021 1:40 pm
Come listen to the story of billboards in Utah from a planner’s perspective – from Lady Bird Johnson’s 1965 highway beautification efforts to where we are today. This session is designed as an open-source ‘toolkit’ for use at the local level, enabling planners to inform and educate their respective city and county councils, planning commissions, state representatives, chambers of commerce, and others about Utah’s billboard laws, and the impacts of those laws on their local planning and community development efforts.
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