Breckenridge officials consider town’s role in requiring that new homes fit the community’s character
Officials rehashed a discussion started in 2007 with a new modern lens to determine what type of requirements related to residential development fit the current community wants and needs

Tripp Fay/Courtesy photo
Concerns around the development of increasingly larger homes in Breckenridge stem back to conversations in 2007. Now, a trend where smaller homes are being demolished to build larger ones brought the topic back to officials’ desks.
Breckenridge Town Council revisited a discussion from November about neighborhood preservation and what kind of power the town has regarding the look and feel of homes in some of its more established neighborhoods, according to a Jan. 28 meeting.
The town can either encourage or require certain elements of new residential development. Options include implementing limits and rules on building height and orientation, setbacks, material diversion and recycling during and after construction, and certain sustainability standards for the sake of maintaining community “character.”
The concept of controlling building height and setbacks to create uniformity isn’t unique to Breckenridge. Communities like Vail and Aspen have similar guidelines.
A building height cap of 35 feet and requirements for setback distance are already baked into the town’s development code, but staff members and officials discussed potential new energy and sustainability requirements and whether the town should leave design elements in the hands of homeowners or not.
Town staff members advised Breckenridge officials to not impose requirements related to the aesthetic design of residential development.
“There’s some really cool (home styles) — everything from midcentury to European chalet to mountain modern to more rustic contemporary. … Let some of that variety live,” Planning Manager Chris Kulick said.
Council supported this recommendation. Officials were also presented with an opportunity to make the building height requirement more strict, lowering the height limit to 30 feet.
“I think, if you ratchet it down to 30 or 32 (feet), what you’re going to end up with is a lot of modern three-story houses with really flat, low pitches,” council member Todd Rankin said. “So I think that 30 (feet-tall) actually is going to drive maybe a result that we don’t want.”
Council member Steve Gerard agreed, and said tightening the height limit could inhibit creative architecture that brings variety to Breckenridge’s residential housing landscape.
Mayor Kelly Owens said some existing homes that are 35 feet tall don’t impose on the town’s character or stick out as not fitting in.
Sustainability concerns were a driving force behind council’s November discussion since members raised worries about the energy usage and material waste that accompanies demolitions and the construction of larger homes.
Council members described being “stunned” by stats taken from a 2023 report out of Pitkin County. Their officials conducted the study following the adoption of regulations that placed limits on maximum home sizes. The report demonstrated “a strong correlation between home size and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per area.” It found that as home size increased from 1,000 square feet to 14,000 square feet, which was the size of the largest homes considered in the study, greenhouse gas emissions more than doubled. Also, it demonstrated the maintenance of large homes in unincorporated Pitkin County generated nearly 9% of the county’s total 2019 annual greenhouse gas emissions.
Staff members also noted “a more imminent concern related to Xcel (Energy) reaching its limit to supply natural gas and the need to shift more properties to use electricity exclusively for energy” during the November discussion.
Sustainability manager Jessie Burley told council that the town plans to revamp its energy code in 2025 to not only adopt the most recent iteration of an international energy conservation code, but also to figure out a path that will help the town emerge as a leader in the sustainability space. She said staff members plan on bringing recommendations to officials like ways to incentivize electrification.
She said while the town looks to incentivize electrification and could even require certain sustainable actions related to new construction, regulations cannot be too heavy handed.
“It is important to note that there have been several lawsuits nationwide that have essentially rolled back city ordinances — Berkeley, California being one of them, where they did outright ban natural gas,” she said, noting some regulations teeter the line of violating a federal law called the Energy Policy and Conservation Act, which preempts state and local lawmakers from certain things while governing the energy use and energy efficiency of products.
In July 2024, a national coalition challenged an electrification ordinance required by the city of Denver in court.
Kulick and Burley said the town plans to collect ample community input before implementing any potential changes to neighborhood preservation guidelines. There was also discussion whether requirements should vary for single-family homes versus multifamily dwellings and whether there should be recycling requirements, but no concrete decisions were made at the Jan. 28 meeting.

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