Data

Everything that decides what can be built on a lot, gathered into one record: the plan, the zoning, the transit tier, the lot itself, the building code and the local market. Every entry carries its source.

One stair,
every home

A point access block is a small apartment building in which every home opens off one shared stair and lift. No corridor, no second stair, and homes that reach from the front of the building to the back.

TodayTwo stairs, a corridor, one-sided homes, no three-bedrooms.

Now possibleOne stair and lift, through homes, two of four family sized.

The limitBCBC 3.2.10: one exit stair up to six storeys, sprinklered, with a wider stair and smoke control.

Three changes
in two years

TimelineZoning reform, the code change and the new municipal plans arrived within two years of each other. The shaded band is the window between the code change and today.

ZoningBills 44 and 47, November 2023. Three to six homes on most lots, minimum heights and densities in transit-oriented areas, no resident parking minimums near transit.

CodeBC Building Code Revision 3, August 2024. Subsection 3.2.10: one exit stair up to six storeys. One lot is enough.

PlansEvery municipality rewrote its OCP and zoning by the end of 2025, drawing the map of where six storeys are now expected.

Eight municipalities,
eight rule books

The code is provincial. Everything else changes at the boundary: designation names, the zone the plan points to, setbacks, minimum frontages, parking, fire service and the local market.

Lot counts: Form Architects screening of municipal open data, October 2026. Houses on land the new plans designate for apartments. Pitt Meadows publishes no open parcel data; its count comes from the City's map viewer and is shown pending consent.

Seven layers
on every lot

The stackOne Stair reads all seven for every parcel and keeps the source of each line.

1OCP designationWhat the plan expects here: apartment, mixed use, town centre.
2Transit-oriented area tier400 or 800 m from a station sets the minimum height and density.
3ZoningWhat is allowed today, and which zone the plan points to.
4Lot geometryWidth, depth, corner, lane, slope, odd shapes.
5Setbacks and envelopeSide yards decide whether anything fits at all.
6Building Code 3.2.10Six storeys, sprinklers, the wider stair, travel distance.
7Fire service and servicingThe capability note, water supply, the pipe in the street.

The opportunity

17,074

house lots

on land the new plans designate for apartments, seven municipalities

18 to 21 m

the typical lot

on 36 to 38 m of depth, wide enough for four homes a floor

parking minimum

for residents inside a transit-oriented area

2029

SkyTrain opens

seven new stations from Fleetwood to Langley

Width decidesSix storey FAR on one Surrey R3 lot by width band, with 3 m side and 6 m front and rear yards. Half of Surrey's 4,430 Tier 3 R3 lots sit in the 18 to 21 m band, right at the edge.

The opportunity is not evenly spread, and it is site-size dependent. The point access block wins on the narrow and the small: the lot a bar building cannot use.

Surrey holds two thirds of the lots and the SkyTrain. Abbotsford has the clearest land economics, with the median house worth 8 percent of its land. Mission and Chilliwack have the lowest entry cost. The Langleys and Maple Ridge hold smaller, well defined pockets. Each rewards a slightly different building, which is why One Stair carries six forms rather than one.

Sources: BC Building Code 2024 Revision 3, Subsection 3.2.10. Surrey Zoning By-law 12000 and Corporate Report R089 (2024). Form Architects, Fraser Valley Lot Study and Small PAB Study, Surrey, October 2026.

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