Fence rules in Victoria

How tall a fence may be in Victoria

In the street-facing part of a lot a fence may not exceed 1.22 m (4.0 ft). Victoria measures that zone the front yard. Elsewhere on the lot the maximum is 1.83 m (6.0 ft).

The rules live in Schedule S of the Zoning Regulation Bylaw. The governing document is the Zoning Regulation Bylaw, Schedule S — Fences (Bylaw No. 23-025, adopted July 27, 2023).

How the height is measured — and why that matters more than the number

Victoria measures from natural grade; on a slope, re-measured at the highest natural grade adjacent to each corner or edge and then at intervals of no more than 2.5 m.

Four municipalities in this region measure the same fence four different ways. A fence built to the limit under one method can be over the limit under another, which is why a contractor who works across Greater Victoria cannot carry one number in their head.

If the fence sits on a retaining wall

In Victoria: measured from natural grade on the HIGH side of the wall — the wall itself does not count against the fence.

This is the single clause that most often decides a terraced lot, and the region splits on it. The City of Victoria measures from the high side of the wall, so the wall costs the owner nothing. Sidney, Saanich, Central Saanich and View Royal count the wall against the fence. Same drawing, opposite answers.

Corner lots and sight lines

On a corner lot: 1 m (3.3 ft) inside the triangle. The triangle is measured a diagonal 6 m from the corner where one street is an arterial, 3 m otherwise. Driveway sight lines are sent to Section 28 of the Highway Access Bylaw, a different bylaw.

Do you need a permit?

None for a residential fence.

In ten of the thirteen Greater Victoria municipalities an ordinary residential fence needs nothing at all. The exceptions are Langford, where a fence inside a wildfire-interface or riparian development permit area needs a Development Permit; North Saanich, where a fence of 2 m or more is a "structure"; and Colwood, where a pool fence needs a building permit.

What you may not build it out of

Victoria prohibits: barbed wire; razor wire; razor sharp stainless steel strips or similar material; any electrified fence.

What beats these figures in Victoria

Everything above is the general case for an ordinary lot. Each layer below can override it, and for a large minority of properties at least one does. They are not exotic — a strata bylaw, an easement and a heritage designation.

A strata bylaw, or a restrictive covenant on your title: Either can forbid a fence Victoria would allow, dictate its style, height and colour, or require written approval first. Where the ground is common or limited common property you do not control it alone. If you rent, you cannot authorise a fence at all — the owner has to ask.

An easement or right of way crossing your land: A fence is generally not permitted across an easement unless that easement allows it, and it is on your title rather than in any bylaw. Search the title before you set the line.

A heritage conservation area, or a designation on your own property: Victoria has two heritage conservation areas containing twelve districts between them; the largest is Old Town. Inside most of them a heritage alteration permit is required for new construction, subdivision, major alterations to an existing building, and alterations to a building, structure or feature that is protected — by a heritage designation bylaw, by being on the Heritage Register, by a heritage covenant, or by the conservation area’s own schedule of protected properties. Regular maintenance is exempt where materials, design and appearance do not change. A fence is a structure, so a new one is capable of needing a permit in these districts even though Victoria asks for no fence permit anywhere else in the city. The City’s published summary neither lists fences as needing a permit nor exempts them, and the exemptions are set in the conservation area’s own schedule in the Official Community Plan, which means the answer is address-specific. Ask Development Services before ordering materials, not after.

Your zone is named on your property tax notice. Easements and covenants are on your title. The municipality will confirm both.

The trees on your fence line

Almost every fence line wants a tree or two out of the way, and in twelve of the thirteen Greater Victoria municipalities that is regulated — often more tightly than the fence itself. Victoria: Tree Protection Bylaw, in force 1 July 2021.

The smallest tree that is protected here: A Garry Oak, Arbutus, Pacific Yew or Pacific Dogwood over 50 cm in height — about knee high. Also any tree over 30 cm in diameter, any tree of any size on a slope steeper than 33% over 10 m, and any tree of any size within 15 m of the natural boundary of a watercourse.

Pruning needs a permit too, not just removal — the City draws the line at branches over 10 cm in diameter, or at taking more than a quarter of the live foliage.

A hedge counts as a protected tree in Victoria as soon as any single stem exceeds 30 cm in diameter — so the hedge some owners plant instead of a fence becomes regulated as it matures.

Across the region the smallest protected tree ranges from three centimetres thick in Sidney to eighty in Highlands, and Sooke is the only one of the thirteen with no tree bylaw on private property at all. Walk the line and identify what is in the way before you accept a quote, not after the posts are ordered.

The same fence, across a municipal boundary

Greater Victoria is thirteen separate local governments and the boundary between two of them often runs down the middle of an ordinary residential street. Here is what the same fence runs into a short distance from Victoria.

Put that fence on a retaining wall and the answer reverses: Victoria measures from the high side so the wall costs you nothing, while Saanich counts wall and fence together against the same maximum.

If the lot touched water, Oak Bay would prohibit the fence outright where Victoria's fence rules say nothing about water.

Colwood sets no fence height limit at all, where Victoria holds you to 1.83 m (6.0 ft).

On a corner lot Victoria caps it at 1 m inside the triangle; Esquimalt has no corner rule for fences at all.

None of this is a claim about which municipality borders Victoria — that is a geographic question we have not verified. It is a claim about how far apart the rules are inside one region.

Is a fence a "structure" in Victoria?

Schedule S regulates fences directly, so the question does not arise in the same way it does elsewhere.

It sounds like a technicality and it is not. A rule written for "structures" — a water setback, a permit trigger, a setback from a lot line — reaches a fence only where that municipality counts a fence as one. The region is split roughly down the middle.

What we could not settle

Section 28 of the Highway Access Bylaw, which Schedule S 4.a incorporates for driveway sight triangles, has not been read. The repeal of the former standalone Fence Bylaw No. 93-112 is corroborated but the repealing text was not read in the source.

We publish open questions rather than smoothing them over. If a figure here matters to a job you are about to commit money to, confirm it with the municipality for your exact address.