What the August 4 zoning reversion did to your own lot

The Beat

City Council approved the repeal of blanket rezoning on April 8 2026, and the rule changes came into effect on August 4. On that date, the City states, 99 per cent of properties returned to the zoning that applied before Rezoning for Housing. Eight low-density districts came back into Land Use Bylaw 1P2007 under their earlier names, meaning R-C1, R-C1L, R-C1N, R-C2, R-1, R-1N, R-2, and R-CGex. Your lot kept its frontage and its address. The district governing what can be built on it went back to a name it carried before 2024.

What actually reverted We read the district off the City's own map before we write a word about what a lot can carry.

The City's wording is that any properties rezoned in 2024 that have not applied or been approved for an R-CG, R-G, or H-GO development will revert back to the previous land use district. A parcel swept into R-CG by the 2024 citywide rezoning, and left alone since, now reads as it read before August 6 2024. The change landed at the record level on a single date, with no notice to sign and no form to file.

What R-C1 and R-C2 allow

The City describes R-C1 as the zone for contextually sensitive redevelopment of single-detached homes, where a home may include a secondary suite or a backyard suite. R-C2 covers the same ground and adds semi-detached and duplex forms. R-CG remains in the bylaw for the parcels that kept it, and it allows rowhouses and townhouses alongside the forms R-C2 permits. Council also lowered the R-CG height ceiling from 11 metres to 10, dropped maximum lot coverage from 60 per cent to 55, ended zero lot line developments, and returned rowhouses to permitted use in that district.

The one search that settles your address

The City's land use districts page carries a search field headed "Find your land use district", with the instruction "Enter your address to find your land use district and property information". Type the street address and read the code that comes back. Every residential district is listed further down the same page with the housing forms it permits, so the code and its meaning sit on one screen. The repeal page sends homeowners to that same tool. It takes about as long as looking up a bus route.

The parcels that kept the newer district

Some lots did not move. The City lists the criteria for exemption, and a parcel qualifies where it received approval for a permit or subdivision application under R-CG, R-G, or H-GO zoning before the proposed bylaw took effect. A parcel also qualifies where that permit or subdivision application went in before the first reading of the bylaw. The remaining category covers a parcel rezoned through an approved rezoning application the owner applied for after August 6 2024. If you bought from a builder inside the past two years and the permit is already in hand, that is the paragraph that applies.

What the district does not decide

A district sets what may be applied for. The City's own line is that a development permit is always required, and that an owner wanting more choice of housing types needs a rezoning application approved before a development permit follows. A rowhouse on a lot that reverted is still reachable, running through a Land Use Redesignation approved by Council and then the permits any build requires. The City also notes that the information on its page has no legal status as an interpretation of the bylaw, which is why the address search and the bylaw text sit one click apart.

If you are checking today

No action is required from property owners, in the City's words. The reversion applied on its own. What the search gives you is the current answer for one address, which is the thing to have in hand before you plan an addition or list the house. If you want us to check it against what a buyer will ask, start the conversation.

The search field sits on the City's land use districts page. Your address returns one code.