Site plans for Blue Mountains, New South Wales: drawn in minutes
Need a site plan for a shed, patio, carport, deck, pool or granny flat in Blue Mountains? Site plans and assessments in minutes, drawn over the real lot.
Towns and suburbs in Blue Mountains include Katoomba, Springwood, Leura, Blaxland and Glenbrook.
Building in Blue Mountains
In the Blue Mountains, a backyard shed, garage or carport is treated as an outbuilding that must never be habitable. It sits behind the building line of every road frontage, has a height limit above existing ground, and its floor area depends on whether the lot falls under or over a set size. On rural and conservation land a screened outbuilding may sit forward. The council also asks for low-reflective metal and forms that suit the locality.
In the low-density zone, front setbacks stay within a band around the neighbours' average, hatchet lots keep a set distance from the lot in front, and site cover counts sheds and garages along with the house, with part of the lot kept pervious. Pools sit at the rear, further from boundaries where the pool or its surrounds are raised.
Applications for homes in Katoomba, Springwood, Leura or Blaxland can be followed on the council's DA tracking service.
What we hold for Blue Mountains
For Blue Mountains we hold the council’s own rules for:
- sheds, garden sheds, garages and carports
- patios, pergolas, louvred roofs, decks and shade sails
- pools, fences and retaining walls
- granny flats
- driveways, water tanks and shipping containers
We also hold its current fee schedule.
At each lot we check the state’s mapping for flood, bushfire, landslide, heritage and native vegetation. We also read the council’s application register for past applications on the lot.
Last checked
How approval works in New South Wales
In New South Wales a small structure goes through the planning pathway it fits. Exempt development needs no approval and nothing is lodged, but the structure has to meet every exempt standard and the land must not be excluded from it. Complying development is a fast approval: a complying development certificate from a registered certifier or the council, for work that meets the state's complying standards. Anything else needs a development application to the council, assessed against its local environmental plan and development control plan. The certifier or the council reads the site plan for the structure's size and its distance to each boundary and the house, and for exempt work the plan is the owner's own record. Size, height, distance to each boundary and the land itself decide the pathway, as per the State Environmental Planning Policy (Exempt and Complying Development Codes) 2008.
Drawing the plan
Type the property address, the lot’s real boundaries load from official land records in New South Wales, and you place the structure over the aerial view. The plan prints to scale with boundary lengths, setback distances, a north arrow, a legend, a site coverage table and a title block, as the site plan for a DA or a complying development certificate.
What a certifier in Blue Mountains will ask you
Is the patio a pergola, a louvred roof or a solid roof?
An open pergola and a roofed patio are treated differently near the boundary, and louvres that shut to shed water count as a roof. Roofed, it also adds to the site cover total on the sheet.
Is the carport open, or closed in?
How open the carport is changes whether it needs a fire rated wall near the boundary, and a roller door or a later enclosure reopens the question. A shed never takes the open carport exemption.
Is the lot in an overlay, and what is the zoning?
A flood, bushfire, heritage or character overlay can bring a planning approval on top of the building approval, and the zone decides which of the council’s rules apply. The mapped overlays are read at the lot as the structure goes on the plan.
How high can a retaining wall and a fence go?
Each takes its own height test, and a retaining wall carrying a fence has its own approval. Both heights go on the sheet for the certifier to read together.
The figures for your own lot are read in a minute, from its address.
Every question a certifier asks is on the New South Wales page.
Changes on the way
Rule changes announced for Blue Mountains, for New South Wales and for the whole country, the state and national lines in full on the New South Wales page, each with the page that says so and the day we read it.
In the next 90 days
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Codes SEPP and the complying development variations pathway
Source planningportal.nsw.gov.au, read
Later
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National Construction Code 2025
Source nsw.gov.au, read
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ABCB Housing Provisions 2025 (with NCC 2025)
Source abcb.gov.au, read
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AS 1926.1:2024 Swimming pool safety barriers
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
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NCC 2025 Housing Provisions Part 10.8
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
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NCC 2025 Housing Provisions Part 9.2
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
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NCC 2025 Volume Two Part H6, Specification 42 and Housing Provisions Section 13
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
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NCC 2025 Volume Two Part H8
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
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National Construction Code, residential pause
Source treasury.gov.au, read
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National Construction Code, next edition
Source abcb.gov.au, read
-
No date yet
Building (Approvals and Practitioners) Act 2026
Source nsw.gov.au, read
-
No date yet
Planning for Bush Fire Protection 2026
Source rfs.nsw.gov.au, read
-
No date yet
Standard and model conditions of consent (explanation of intended effect)
Source planningportal.nsw.gov.au, read
-
No date yet
Statewide low rise housing code and targeted assessment (discussion paper)
Source planningportal.nsw.gov.au, read
-
No date yet
AS 3959:2018 Construction of buildings in bushfire prone areas
Source store.standards.org.au, read
-
No date yet
AS 4678-2002 Earth retaining structures
Source store.standards.org.au, read
What we changed for Blue Mountains
No change to the rules we hold for Blue Mountains yet.
Council notices
No story for Blue Mountains yet.
The sources we read for Blue Mountains
2 sources read for Blue Mountains, the newest on , each below with the day it was last read.
Planning schemes and codes
Fees
Follow Blue Mountains in a feed reader: www.rapidsiteplan.au/site-plan/blue-mountains/feed.xml. Every council and state has one, listed on rule changes by council and state.
RapidSiteplan is design software: you confirm details, measure on site and your certifier or council makes the approval decision. The rule above is general information, not building or legal advice. Boundaries shown are indicative, a surveyor is recommended where exact positions matter.
Serving postcodes 2780 and surrounds.
Plans for the job
Questions people ask
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