Skokie, IL Zoning Overlays & Bonuses: Downtown Design Guide (2026)

Skokie's B6 Downtown Science and Technology district, created by Ord. No. 07-1-C-3483 on January 16, 2007 and carried into the current Article VII numbering by the April 2019 recodification, is meant to encourage science and technology employment in a transit-oriented, pedestrian-friendly setting near the downtown core. Section 118-147(2) requires every lot in the district to develop in conformance with a set of design guidelines that the Village's Appearance Commission must approve, and it does not leave the guidelines' scope open-ended: the code lists 13 minimum elements they must cover, including building and land use types, parks and open spaces, vehicular and pedestrian circulation, streetscape elements and design, loading and service areas, the location of building entries, building footprints, facades and wall materials, building envelopes including heights and setbacks, vehicle storage, building and directional signage, and landscaping that both improves the pedestrian environment and ties new buildings into the surrounding neighborhood.

Approval of the district-wide guidelines does not end review project by project: subsection (2) also requires the Appearance Commission to separately review and approve each individual building to confirm it conforms to the approved guidelines before construction can proceed. That two-step process sits on top of the mandatory site plan approval that subsection (1) requires for any development in the district, and the bulk standards in subsection (3), which set a minimum building height of 40 feet, a maximum of 180 feet, and yards abutting residential districts equal to 15 percent of building height but never less than 10 feet, all applied by the Plan Commission alongside the Appearance Commission's design sign-off in Skokie, Cook County, Illinois.