- Conservation Halton - for the property is within Conservation Halton’s regulatory area
- Burlington Hydro - if there is a hydro easement or overhead wires on or near the property.
- The applicable pipeline - for property beside or near a pipeline
- The Niagara Escarpment Commission - for property within the NEC
- The Ministry of Transportation - for property within MTO’s regulatory area
Zoning Clearance Certificates
The first thing you will need to get from the City of Burlington is an approved zoning clearance certificate before you can apply for any building pool permit, or business licence. All certificates expire one year from the date they were issued.
What is a zoning clearance certificate?
A zoning clearance certificate is a detailed review of your proposal for a future building permit application. It helps staff make sure that your project meets with all zoning regulations in the applicable City Zoning Bylaw and other laws. For example, you may need approval from external agencies, like Conservation Halton, depending on your property features and location.
A Zoning By-law controls the use of land in your community, such as:
- How land may be used
- Where buildings and other structures can be located
- The types of buildings that are permitted and how they may be used and
- The lot sizes and dimensions, parking requirements, building heights and setbacks from the street.
Please make sure your Zoning Clearance Certificates are approved before applying for a building permit of business licence.
- All zoning clearance certificates are good for one year from the date they are issued when no building permit application has been submitted to the Building Department. They expire one year after they are issued.
- Make sure your application complies with the applicable City Zoning Bylaw and other laws.
- Make sure your plans are:
- to scale and
- include all required information listed on the submission checklists. Please follow our submission standards.
- If you need approval from external agencies, get your approval from these agencies first and submit them with your zoning certificate application.
- Use our interactive zoning map to find the zone and applicable Zoning Bylaw for your property
- For information on the street width for your property, or if you need to request this from staff, use our Deemed Street Width App.
Zoning Clearance Certificate Types
Pre-building approval application
This application is for residential projects like building a deck, building an accessory structure like a shed or gazebo, making renovations to a house, building a new house, building additional residential units, or building a residential building with 10 units or less.
Non-residential zoning clearance certificate
This application is for industrial, commercial, institutional, multi-residential (more than 10 living units), business licenses (including home based business) or other non-residential uses.
Residential swimming pool application
This application is for a residential swimming pool. This includes, a zoning review a forestry review and a pool enclosure review.
Zoning Verification Letter
You can ask for a letter to confirm zoning information such as permitted uses and regulations for a property or survey compliance that does not require a zoning clearance certificate. We recommend that you get a detailed letter of use to confirm that a use is permitted.
Apply for a Property Information Request if you need a Zoning Verification Letter.