18.235.010 Purpose.
The purpose of this chapter is to enhance, protect, and promote the aesthetic, ecological, and economic environment in the City of Topeka through landscaping associated with new construction. Landscaping achieves the following goals:
(a) Preserves and enhances Topeka’s urban forest;
(b) Promotes the reestablishment of vegetation in urban areas for health and urban wildlife reasons;
(c) Establishes and enhances a visual character which recognizes aesthetics and safety issues;
(d) Promotes the compatibility between land uses by reducing the visual, noise, and lighting impacts of specific development on users of the site and abutting properties;
(e) Unifies development, and enhances and defines public and private places;
(f) Promotes the use and retention of existing vegetation;
(g) Aids in energy conservation by providing shade from the sun and shelter from the wind;
(h) Mitigates the loss of natural resources; and
(i) Reduces soil erosion and the volume and rate of discharge of stormwater runoff. (Ord. 17846 § 1, 6-11-02. Code 1995 § 48-38.00.)