Garden Suites in Barrie

Barrie is a single-tier city, so there is no regional step: the application goes to the City of Barrie Building Services. The suite is applied for as a new building on your lot, with drawings of its own. Barrie has a site alteration by-law as well, and before any digging is booked we ask the city whether the suite’s excavation needs a permit under it or is covered by the building permit. Most Barrie lots are zoned under By-law 2009-141, but the Allandale station area runs on a community planning permit system and some lands taken in from neighbouring municipalities still carry their old zoning, so we confirm which applies to your address.

Most of Barrie is under the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority (LSRCA). The west of the city is under the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority. Whichever covers the lot, a suite needs that authority’s permit only inside its regulated area, since Ontario’s O. Reg. 41/24 counts building a structure as development activity. We check the mapping on both sides of that line.

Barrie allows up to four residential units per lot in residential zones, so an owner can add up to three additional residential units to an existing home. These units can be inside the main house, attached to it, or detached from it, and accessory buildings such as coach houses or garages are eligible, provided the units meet the zoning standards for the property’s zone.

Not usually. Barrie’s Private Tree By-law 2014-115 regulates injuring or removing trees on private property only when the trees are part of a woodlot of half an acre or larger, so a typical residential lot does not need a tree removal permit unless the work is part of a development application. The trees still go on the survey, since the suite’s foundation and its service trench are planned around any that are staying.

Yes. We take on garden suites across Barrie, including Allandale and Painswick, within an hour of our Richmond Hill office. The first consultation is free, by phone or on site.

Three things to start: property address and a survey, if you have one; whether the suite is for family or rent; and photos of the backyard and the side-yard access. Send those and we tell you what the City of Barrie Building Services will ask for before we quote.

Yes. Barrie lets a detached building on a residential lot hold one of its three additional units, and Ontario’s O. Reg. 299/19 puts no family test on who lives in it. The suite can be rented once the City of Barrie Building Services has issued its building permit and passed its final inspection.

Barrie names garages and coach houses among the buildings that can hold an additional unit, so the use is allowed where the zone’s standards are met. The distance from the house comes next: O. Reg. 299/19 calls for 4 m between a building with an additional unit and any other building on the lot with a home in it, unless the zoning permits less, and a garage built close to the house may fall short. If it passes, the conversion goes to the City of Barrie Building Services as a new unit with drawings of its own.

Under O. Reg. 299/19 the house, the suite and any garage together may cover 45 per cent of an urban residential lot that has additional units, or more where the zoning allows. Within that total, the rear and side setbacks and the height limit for your zone, under By-law 2009-141 for most of Barrie, decide where the suite sits and how tall it gets. We draw all of it on the site plan the City of Barrie Building Services checks.

Yes. APLI shows where the application stands and emails you as the City of Barrie Building Services moves it along. Its file is larger than a renovation’s, since a suite is a building in its own right: a site plan fixing its position from the survey, architectural and structural sheets, the heating and plumbing design, and a grading plan where the yard changes. When the examiner comments, we reply to each point and replace the sheets in that application.