Site plans for Inner West, New South Wales: drawn in minutes
Need a site plan for a shed, patio, carport, deck, pool or granny flat in Inner West? Site plans and assessments in minutes, drawn over the real lot.
Building in Inner West
The local rule our master holds for the Inner West concerns parking rather than building: a resident holding a mobility parking permit who has no off-street parking may apply for a signed mobility parking zone near home, shared with other permit holders.
Everything else is measured against the state's planning codes for now: exempt development for small structures that meet the standards, complying development through a certifier, or a development application. Each lot is also checked against the state's bushfire, flood, heritage, landslide and vegetation mapping. Inner West Council takes development applications through the NSW Planning Portal.
What we hold for Inner West
For Inner West we hold the council’s own rules for driveways.
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 Inner West will ask you
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 big is it, and how big is the lot?
The size and the height decide whether the structure needs building approval at all, and the council can add limits that step with the lot’s size. The sheet prints the lot’s area and the running total of site cover.
Is the patio, shed or carport attached to the house?
Whether it fixes to the house changes how it is classified, and so what the certifier checks near the boundary. The sheet says which it is.
How close to the boundary can it go?
The distance to each boundary decides whether the work can stand where it is drawn or needs an application for a closer position, and close to a side or rear boundary the fire rules apply too. The sheet dimensions the distance from the structure to every boundary.
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 Inner West, 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
-
Codes SEPP and the complying development variations pathway
Source planningportal.nsw.gov.au, read
Later
-
National Construction Code 2025
Source nsw.gov.au, read
-
ABCB Housing Provisions 2025 (with NCC 2025)
Source abcb.gov.au, read
-
AS 1926.1:2024 Swimming pool safety barriers
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
-
NCC 2025 Housing Provisions Part 10.8
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
-
NCC 2025 Housing Provisions Part 9.2
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
-
NCC 2025 Volume Two Part H6, Specification 42 and Housing Provisions Section 13
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
-
NCC 2025 Volume Two Part H8
Source ncc.abcb.gov.au, read
-
National Construction Code, residential pause
Source treasury.gov.au, read
-
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 Inner West
No change to the rules we hold for Inner West yet.
Council notices
No story for Inner West yet.
The sources we read for Inner West
No page of Inner West’s own is on our watch yet.
Follow Inner West in a feed reader: www.rapidsiteplan.au/site-plan/inner-west/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.
Plans for the job
Questions people ask
More councils in New South Wales