In 2020, the City of Nashua
embarked on a year-long
comprehensive planning process
to update its citywide master
plan. In the midst of challenges
associated with the COVID-19
pandemic, critical narratives
centered around addressing racial
and social inequity in the country,
and larger concerns for climate
change impacts on our local and
regional ecosystems, the Imagine
Nashua planning process did not
take a step back, and felt it was
important to engage the Nashua
community—now more than ever—
in crafting a sustainable roadmap
for the future, one which places
equity, resilience and climate
protection at its core.
Comprehensive
Citywide Plans
Comprehensive citywide plans are
a primary tool for setting long-
term policy goals for a community,
most of which require sustained
effort beyond the career spans
of individual civil servants or
elected officials. For this reason,
comprehensive plans must be
rooted in engagement efforts, to
ensure that community consensus,
along with topical expertise, helps
direct the long-term vision. While
the plan is not, in itself, a binding
ordinance, many tools the City can
employ—most notably zoning—are
to be in accordance with sucha
master plan. A primary purpose
of this plan is to describe the
intent behind many of the policies
and programs the City of Nashua
intends to implement in the
coming years and decades.
The Imagine Nashua
Comprehensive Citywide Plan—
from here onwards referred to
simply as Imagine Nashua—places
a document-wide focus on equity,
resilience, and climate protection
as core values driving the vision
and framework of the plan. These
three core values bind the six plan
topic areas or elements important
to the Nashua community: land
use and development, economic
growth and development, housing,
mobility and transit, open space
and the environment, and arts and
culture.
p Goals
In-person library event showcasing the
Plan’s draft recommendations.
Comprehensive Master Plan
NH Citywide Master Plans
While not every plan topic is
required by statutory law to be
included in the master plan,
in New Hampshire, a land use
section—providing an overview
Colm 4ic1a [OFM Oo TA en OLNrsM-UaLe Mm aale)
proposed location, extent, and
intensity of future land use—is
an important and required
element of a master plan.
