N102: Comprehensive Development One Hundred and Two Zone

What the zone allows

Homes allowed

Townhouses, up to four homes, 0.5 to 1.5 floor space ratio

Main uses

Townhouses; boarders, Level 1 home occupation

Lot coverage

50%

Height limit

Main buildings 9.5 m or three storeys, whichever is less; accessory buildings 4.5 m

Setbacks

Exterior lot lines 3.0 m, 6.0 m where a garage faces one (accessory buildings no closer than the main building); municipal lane 4.5 m (garage 6.0 m, accessory buildings 1.5 m); interior lot lines 1.8 m

A three- or four-home townhouse development on lots with a municipal lane, per the zone's intent.

Density: floor space ratio 0.5 to 1.5, and at most four homes (s. 8102.3.1).

No visitor parking is required (s. 8102.5.1).

Each home has its own private outdoor amenity space (s. 8102.6.1).

No doors on the building faces facing the lane, garage doors aside (s. 8102.6.2).

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).

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).

Fences and walls up to 1.2 m between the house and the front lot line and beside it along a flanking street, and up to 1.8 m behind and beside it elsewhere (Figure 3); measured from existing grade, a fence within 1.0 m of a retaining wall counting the wall's height; no barbed, razor or electric wire (s. 140.5.2).

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.

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)).

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.

Parking (s. 150.3): townhouses of 3 or 4 homes 1.5 spaces per home; of 5 or more, 2 per home (one in a garage or underground) plus 0.2 per home for visitors; rowhouses 2 per home (one in a garage or underground), plus 0.2 for visitors unless each is on its own lot.

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).

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).

Every single detached house, in any zone, may hold one secondary suite, a home inside it that stays part of the same property (ss. 120, 140.3.8(a)).

No commercial vehicle or trailer over 5,500 kg, and no boat over 8.6 m, parked or stored outside a building (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).

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).

A density figure ending in a half home or more rounds up; less is dropped (s. 130.2.2).

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).

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

Inside a transit-oriented area (s. 150.5.6, Figure 2), homes need no minimum parking, though accessible spaces are still required (s. 150.7.5); other uses keep their rates.

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

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 8102 of City of Abbotsford Zoning Bylaw No. 2400-2014 (summarised in our words); zone map: Open Government Licence – City of Abbotsford.