CCM: City Centre Mixed Use Zone

What the zone allows

Homes allowed

Apartments and congregate housing, at a floor space ratio of 1.5 to 2.75 (3.5 in a transit-oriented area; up to 6.5 with the density bonus); lock-off units

Main uses

Animal hospital, apartments, assembly, brewing and vinting outlet, brew-pub, child care centre, civic use, coffee shop, commercial school, community service, congregate housing, courier and delivery, financial institution, health care office, indoor recreation, liquor store, media studio, microbrewery, office, personal services, pet daycare, printing, pub, restaurant, retail, tourist accommodation; boarders, home child care (major), Level 1 home occupation, lock-off units

Lot coverage

95%

Height limit

At least three storeys; no maximum set

Setbacks

Street lot lines at least 3.0 m (0.0 m for a first storey with commercial uses) and at most 6.0 m; interior lot lines 6.0 m (3.0 m for the first three storeys from an interior lot line that meets a street; 0.0 m for a first storey with commercial uses); accessory buildings 3.0 m

Density: a floor space ratio of 1.5 to 2.75, or up to 3.5 in a transit-oriented area; with a density bonus contribution under s. 140, 3.75 more, to at most 6.5 (ss. 555.3.1, 555.3.2). The zone is meant for land the City Centre Neighbourhood Plan designates City Centre Core.

Where the City Centre plan's Map 4 (Commercial Streets) marks required commercial, the ground floor of the building facing that street holds no apartments or congregate housing along it (s. 555.5.2).

Common outdoor amenity space of at least 3.0 m² per home, outside the required setbacks, open to all residents, with no side shorter than 6.0 m and no slope over 5% (s. 555.5.1).

Density bonus (s. 140.6): on a lot inside the Density Bonus Eligibility Area (Figure 7), the zone's bonus density is allowed if at least 0.3% of the bonus floor area, or one home, whichever is greater, is built as below-market rental (homes of at least 86 m² and three bedrooms, handed to a government agency or non-profit for 60 years, rented below the CMHC median rent to households below Abbotsford's median income), or $15.40 per m² of bonus floor area is paid to the City's affordable housing fund before the building permit, or the bonus floor area is used for a non-residential use the zone allows.

A Level 1 home occupation may also run in a secondary suite, garden suite, coach house, accessory farm home or lock-off unit, by someone living in that home (s. 140.2.10).

Boarders (s. 140.3.2): in a house or duplex, up to four in the principal home, two per bedroom, never together with a short-term rental; in an apartment, townhouse or rowhouse, one boarder, not in a building with supported housing or congregate care. Parking: one space per bedroom in a house or duplex (s. 150.3).

Home occupation, Level 1 (s. 140.3.5(a)): inside the home, by its residents only; no nuisance (noise, smell, traffic and the like), no outside storage, and no outward change to the home's residential look; no customer visits and no sign. No extra parking (s. 150.3).

Home child care for up to 25 children is allowed in a zone permitting apartments or townhouses, one per lot, outside the homes themselves (s. 140.2.8(b)).

Parking (s. 150.3): apartments 1 space per studio, 1.25 per one-bedroom and 1.5 per larger home, plus 0.2 per home for visitors (a den over 6.5 m² counts as a bedroom, s. 150.2.4); congregate housing 1 per home or 0.5 per sleeping unit plus 0.2 for visitors.

New residential buildings give each home with required parking an energized outlet for Level 2 charging (s. 150.6).

For a strata development, lot width, coverage, density and floor space ratio are measured on the whole strata plan, not each strata lot (s. 130.2.4).

Cannabis stores: at most five in the City, and only on the ten lots listed in s. 140.2.6 (on Mt. Lehman Road, South Fraser Way, Sumas Way, North Parallel Road and Whatcom Road).

A temporary building is allowed here as a commercial retail unit, with a permit, and removed when the permit ends; anywhere, one may stand during construction (s. 130.5).

Short-term rental (paid nightly accommodation where no guest stays more than 30 days in any 12 months, s. 120) isn't a listed use in this zone, and a use a zone doesn't list isn't allowed (s. 130.1).

Accessory buildings go up only with or after the main building or use; one attached to the main building counts as part of it and keeps its setbacks (s. 140.4.1).

Chimneys, sills and bay windows may reach 0.6 m into a setback; steps, eaves, canopies, cantilevered balconies and open porches 1.2 m into front, rear and side-street setbacks and 0.6 m into interior side setbacks and between buildings; below-grade window wells, stairs and ramps anywhere (s. 140.4.2).

Fences and walls up to 1.8 m; no barbed, razor or electric wire (s. 140.5.2).

Commercial vehicles over 5,500 kg are parked only inside a building unless they serve the lot's main use (s. 140.5.4).

No vehicle, recreational vehicle or trailer may be parked or stored on a lawn or landscaped area (s. 140.5.4(d)).

Garbage, compost and recycling bins for apartments, commercial and industrial uses are screened to 2.0 m, kept out of the front setback and away from homes; a townhouse lot of 5 or more homes has a central bin area or pick-up for each home (s. 140.4.5).

Landscaping (s. 140.7): the front setback is a continuous landscaped strip at least 3.0 m wide, and parking, loading and outdoor storage are screened from a street by 3.0 m of landscaping and from a neighbouring lot by 1.5 m; the rest of the lot not built on or paved is landscaped.

Supported housing (s. 140.2.7), always under a housing agreement with the City: in an apartment or dormitory in any zone, on the RMM zone's terms, except on a lot whose zone allows farming or in the ALR; and in a single detached house in any residential zone outside the farm zones and the ALR, for up to ten residents, at least 200 m from other supported housing or a school (homes licensed before April 1, 2008 aside), never on a lot with a secondary suite, garden suite, coach house, residential care, boarding house, home child care or home occupation, and with no outward sign of a non-residential use.

Land given up for road widening, a corner cut or a walkway still counts in the lot area for density and floor space ratio (s. 140.4.10).

Parking (s. 150.3): retail and personal services 1 space per 35 m² of floor area, offices 1 per 40 m², financial and health care offices 1 per 30 m², restaurants 1 per 20 m², pubs and assembly 1 per 10 m², tourist accommodation 1 per room; over 2,500 m² of commercial floor area on one lot, 1 per 35 m² for all of it (s. 150.2.7).

Parking can be cut by up to 20% beside or near the official community plan's Primary Transit Corridor (10% within 200 m, 10% more within 400 m for $23,000 a space), and rental-only apartments by 10% inside the Urban Development Boundary, 5% more on the corridor or downtown (ss. 150.5.1, 150.5.3, 150.5.4).

A parking area of five or more spaces, driveways included, is paved, marked and lit without glare onto neighbours (s. 150.12).

A commercial or industrial building of 500 m² or more has an off-street loading space at least 9.2 m by 4.0 m and 4.5 m clear (s. 150.14).

No building within 15.0 m of the natural boundary of a lake, slough, swamp, pond or watercourse (tributaries included); 30.0 m from Nathan Creek, Poignant Creek, Clayburn Creek east of Old Clayburn Road and the Sumas River in its floodplain; 60.0 m from the Fraser River in its floodplain; 15.0 m from the inside toe of a dyke or its right-of-way, whichever is more; 7.5 m from a ditch. Fill used to raise a building stays out of these setbacks (ss. 140.8.7, 140.8.8).

Floodproofing (s. 140.8, Schedule E): in the Sumas Lake Bottom, Sumas Prairie, Huntingdon, Matsqui Prairie, Glen Valley and Sumas River areas (A to G), the Fishtrap Creek 100-year floodplain (H) and the watercourse setback areas, floors of living space sit at or above the area's level in Table 1 (for example 11.1 m GSC in areas A, B and D, 9.8 m in Matsqui Prairie, 8.5 m in Glen Valley), or at a lower "reduced" level in areas A, B, E and F where the owner signs a covenant with the City and the Province; farm buildings, renovations and small additions can be exempted under a covenant (s. 140.8.6). The rule printed as floors "not less than 1.5 m above the natural boundary" of a watercourse (s. 140.8.3(c)) reads as a prohibition of floors that high, so how high a floor near a watercourse must sit is unclear; ask the City of Abbotsford.

Nothing may be built on the river side of a dyke or on an island in the Fraser River (s. 140.8.2).

At street corners, a sight triangle (Figure 2) is kept clear of buildings, structures and plants between 1.0 m and 3.0 m above the street (s. 140.4.9).

No vehicle, recreational vehicles included, may be lived in, except that a visitor's RV may be used for up to 72 hours in a row in any 30 days (s. 140.4.11).

Wrecked vehicles only where the zone allows them or a business on the lot needs them, and then inside a building or behind a fence or wall that hides them (s. 140.5.3).

Growing, processing, storing or selling cannabis is not allowed in any zone unless the bylaw provides for it, subject to the provincial ALR rules (s. 140.2.5); cannabis production is a farm use only in the A1 to A6 zones (s. 120).

Every zone also allows public service works and utilities, parks, and seasonal Christmas tree sales (s. 140.1); an emergency shelter on a lot that doesn't border one with homes, under a housing agreement (s. 140.2.3); a temporary accessory emergency shelter during a declared emergency or an extreme weather alert, except on lots whose zone allows farming or in the ALR (ss. 140.2.1, 140.2.2); and soil extraction inside the official community plan's Soil Removal Eligibility Area, under the soil bylaw (s. 140.2.4).

Site-specific exceptions listed in the bylaw by legal description can add or change uses for one property, and development permit areas, the ALR and building rules apply on top. Confirm with the City of Abbotsford's planning and development services before you buy or build.

Source: Section 555 of City of Abbotsford Zoning Bylaw No. 2400-2014 (summarised in our words); zone map: Open Government Licence – City of Abbotsford.