Special purpose district

A special purpose district is a mapped area for which the Zoning Resolution contains a dedicated chapter of rules serving a named local objective — protecting a theater cluster, shaping a business core, guiding a waterfront's redevelopment. New York has mapped dozens. Within one, the underlying districts' rules continue to apply except as the special chapter modifies them, and the modifications can reach use, floor area, height and setback, parking, signage, and process.

Many special districts are internally subdivided into subdistricts or subareas with different rules, so parcel-level boundary resolution matters. For any lot inside one, the special chapter is read first and the general rules fill what it leaves unmodified — a maximum quoted from the underlying district alone may not govern.