Articles

  • Project Initiation

    Thank you for visiting the project website. The RDN will be collecting public feedback in the Fall 2026 on this project, including a survey and open house. At this time, this website will provide information on the project. Subscribe for project updates or check back with us soon when there are opportunities for engagement.

    Thank you for visiting the project website. The RDN will be collecting public feedback in the Fall 2026 on this project, including a survey and open house. At this time, this website will provide information on the project. Subscribe for project updates or check back with us soon when there are opportunities for engagement.

  • Addressing Building Strata

    The Regional District of Nanaimo (RDN) plans for the location, amount and type of residential development through its Official Community Plans (OCP) and zoning bylaw. Within the OCPs and zonings bylaws, this planning occurs through identifying minimum parcel size for subdivision of residential parcels and the number of dwellings permitted per parcel.

    In Rural Residential areas, the RDN typically allows land to be subdivided into 2.0-hectare parcels (4.94 acres). Where the parcel is greater than 2.0 hectares, a parcel may have two dwellings. A practice on some properties has been to register these two permitted dwellings as a strata, which

    The Regional District of Nanaimo (RDN) plans for the location, amount and type of residential development through its Official Community Plans (OCP) and zoning bylaw. Within the OCPs and zonings bylaws, this planning occurs through identifying minimum parcel size for subdivision of residential parcels and the number of dwellings permitted per parcel.

    In Rural Residential areas, the RDN typically allows land to be subdivided into 2.0-hectare parcels (4.94 acres). Where the parcel is greater than 2.0 hectares, a parcel may have two dwellings. A practice on some properties has been to register these two permitted dwellings as a strata, which has become referred to as a building strata.

    While building strata tenure provides an opportunity to subdivide where the land does not comply with minimum parcel size for subdivision in zoning, the form of building strata subdivision is based subdivision of buildings rather than land. The consequences for property owners of this form of subdivision can create uncertainty with respect to zoning, liability, insurance, legislation, health and safety.

    As an alternative to building strata, the RDN is undertaking a project to consider changes to Rural Residential areas in OCPs and zoning to establish a 1.0-hectare minimum parcel size and one dwelling per parcel. This change will enable existing owners within a two dwelling building strata the ability to formerly subdivide the property to create separate parcels of land and will provide an alternative to the creation of future building strata.


  • Project Foundations

    This project is guided by previous work completed for RDN Zoning Bylaw 2500, 2024 and the 2025-2029 Climate Action Plan.

    Housing:

    During the preparation of Bylaw 2500, the RDN considered the challenges with building strata registration and consequences for property owners. Part of the direction on building strata is to provide owners with an alternative tenure. By amending parcel size, many existing owners will have the option to make a subdivision application to create a fee simple parcel. While other servicing requirements must still be demonstrated through the subdivision process, it removes the policy and regulatory barrier

    This project is guided by previous work completed for RDN Zoning Bylaw 2500, 2024 and the 2025-2029 Climate Action Plan.

    Housing:

    During the preparation of Bylaw 2500, the RDN considered the challenges with building strata registration and consequences for property owners. Part of the direction on building strata is to provide owners with an alternative tenure. By amending parcel size, many existing owners will have the option to make a subdivision application to create a fee simple parcel. While other servicing requirements must still be demonstrated through the subdivision process, it removes the policy and regulatory barrier from the consideration of an application. Direction provided by the RDN Board through this project is that the parcel size change will not increase the potential number of dwelling units under existing zoning.

    Climate:

    A priority action of the 2025-2029 Climate Action Plan (from the RDN Climate Action Technical Advisory Committee) is understanding how climate change, populations growth and water demand will impact local water resources and regional water security. To work towards a regional understanding of cumulative impacts on groundwater resources, with climate and growth projections, the RDN can identify and plan for potential impacts to common groundwater sources. In alignment with this direction, this project anticipates demand from on groundwater from residential development that may occur under existing zoning and amended 1.0 hectare parcel size scenario.

  • Project Phases

    Given the broad scope for related to providing an alternative residential tenure and anticipating servicing capacity, the project has been separated into phases. The outcome of each phase will be to present density neutral options for consideration in OCP and zoning amendments.

    Phase 1

    This first phase of the Rural Residential Minimum Parcel Size Project establishes a process to consider policy and regulation changes for existing rural residential properties two dwelling building strata lots within the Rural Residential zones. This phase is a priority to provide existing owners with an alternative to building strata and that the subdivision will place

    Given the broad scope for related to providing an alternative residential tenure and anticipating servicing capacity, the project has been separated into phases. The outcome of each phase will be to present density neutral options for consideration in OCP and zoning amendments.

    Phase 1

    This first phase of the Rural Residential Minimum Parcel Size Project establishes a process to consider policy and regulation changes for existing rural residential properties two dwelling building strata lots within the Rural Residential zones. This phase is a priority to provide existing owners with an alternative to building strata and that the subdivision will place no further impact on the community and natural environment. Currently this phase is applied to Rural Residential zones within electoral areas zoning bylaws.

    Public engagement into this first phase of the project will be open from Fall 2026 to early 2027. Please provide your perspective on potential changes to OCPs and zoning. If you live within a rural building strata, please let us know your experience and any implications this may have for you.

    This resident input will be carefully reviewed and considered in the final recommendations on changes to OCP policy and zoning bylaws.

    Phase 2

    The second phase of the Rural Residential Minimum Parcel Size Project applies to all other lands within the Rural Residential zones lands of the electoral area zoning bylaws. These lands may be vacant, or contain one or two dwellings. This may also formerly address building strata in other zones not addressed in Phase 1.

    Prior to making formal changes to OCPs and zoning bylaws, the RDN will consider baseline conditions within the areas and for unintended consequences of changes. While the existing permitted residential land use regulations were established forty years ago, conditions within the electoral areas have changed. In some areas, groundwater may already be stressed or vulnerable to contamination. Background work will consider high level risk and better understand options for the form of permitted residential development.

    While Phase 2 has not formally begun, background work will be started for the East Wellington-Pleasant Valley area in support of the upcoming Official Community Plan (OCP) review in the area. This will be a preliminary study of aquifer risk and servicing, considering relative groundwater stress and vulnerability to development. The study may inform the approach to other electoral areas.

    On completion of the East Wellington-Pleasant Valley study in early 2027, the next steps in the project will be determined and further direction from the RDN Board. These next steps will include consideration for other areas of the RDN.

    The proposed changes in both Phase 1 and 2 would permit parcel sizes of 1.0 + ha. and only one dwelling on parcels of any size.