City of Florence Building Department - Landscaping
 

Purpose:  The Landscaping Regulations, as adopted by the City of Florence, are designed to improve the appearance of commercial structures and off-street parking areas, and to promote the City of Florence as an attractive trade and service center by requiring the implementation and preservation of trees and shrubs.  It also provides protection of certain adjoining properties from the noise, glare, overall visual impact and other distractions originating from off-street parking areas.
 

Regulations:  Please click on the link for "Zoning Ordinance".  Then click on Section VI.  Off-Street Parking and Off-Street Truck Loading and then scroll down to (c) for "Off-Street Parking and Maneuvering Area Landscaping Requirements" for the regulations in their entirety.   
 

Generally speaking, the Landscape Ordinance requires six (6) percent of a site to be landscaped.  Frontage landscaping must be provided with one tree and six shrubs for every 40 linear feet of lot frontage.  The number of parking spaces determines whether or not perimeter landscaping is required.  Depending upon how adjoining properties are zoned, frontage landscaping is usually all that is required for those sites within industrial zones.

Landscaped Buffer areas, consisting of a solid unbroken visual screen, eight (8) feet high within two years of planting, must be implemented when developments adjoin certain zones, such as residential.  The actual depth of the buffer is determined by whether or not perimeter landscaping is required.

The landscaper or landscaping company actually performing the work must have a City of Florence Landscaping License, for which a Landscape Certification from the Alabama Department of Agriculture is required.  For more information please call the Plant Protection and Pesticide Division of the Alabama Department of Agriculture at 334-240-7243.