A couple of days ago, I blogged about zoning and form-based planning, and said that I knew nothing about the latter. In a comment that I didn't see at the time because it was accidentally flagged as spam by Movable Type, David Crossley mentioned that we already have form-based planning in Houston, we just have a lousy implementation of it. He expanded greatly on that point here, which I recommend you read. Basically, it talks about what it currently means to be defined as "urban" or "suburban" in Houston, and how altering that definition to better fit the way Houston really is would go a long way towards avoiding the kind of problems that the Bissonnet high rise and other similar developments have caused. Check it out.