Pattern Book Terraces 03: lot sizes, plans and how it sits on a block

In a low and mid rise housing area the smallest lot that works is 18 metres wide and 500 square metres, measured at the front building line. Everywhere else in NSW the pattern needs 21 metres and 600 square metres, and it must also meet whatever minimum lot size the local environmental plan sets for multi dwelling housing.

The lot size grows with the mix of terraces you choose. Three small terraces fit on 500 square metres, three medium terraces need 550, and three large terraces need 625 square metres in a low and mid rise housing area or 680 square metres elsewhere. Corner lots need a little more again because of the secondary street setback.

Every siting condition the architects drew is below, 13 for low and mid rise housing areas and 9 for the rest of NSW. They cover mid block and corner lots and each street orientation, and each one keeps the drawing exactly as it is published, with its own dimensions and its own minimum site area.

Type your address to load your actual block from the NSW cadastre, including its boundaries, zoning and planning layers. Dudils screens lot size, orientation and slope to find patterns that could work. It does not complete a planning eligibility assessment. Dudils screens slope from the national elevation model, which is indicative and not a survey, so confirm the fall across your site. Also check council and State mapping to confirm the land is not bush fire prone or flood prone, and that it is not a heritage item or inside a heritage conservation area.

The pattern is permitted wherever multi dwelling housing in the form of terraces is already allowed with consent in NSW. Two versions exist because the controls differ: one for low and mid rise (LMR) housing areas, which are the well located residential zones within 800 metres walk of selected town centres and stations, and one for everywhere else. You can look up the mapped areas on the NSW Planning Portal, or type your address above and the lot finder checks them for you.

The fast track applies through the Pattern Book Development Code in the Codes SEPP. Like any complying development, it is not available on land the policy excludes, including bush fire prone land and certain flood prone land. Pattern book complying development is also not permitted on heritage items or in heritage conservation areas, although a proposal there can still be lodged as an ordinary development application.

Every proposal must show reasonable solar access to neighbours, as defined in the Low Rise Housing Diversity Design Guide: a living room window of an adjoining dwelling more than 3 metres from the boundary must keep more than 3 hours of direct sun between 9am and 3pm on 21 June, and where it already gets less than that, the sunlight must not be reduced.

Each terrace is two storeys with a masonry shared wall and lightweight framing. The ground floor holds the entry, a living, dining and kitchen space that opens to a private garden at the rear, a laundry, a WC and a flexible room that can be a guest bedroom, home office or granny flat. A double height void sits over the living area so light and air reach the middle of the plan.

Upstairs the base plan gives two bedrooms, a bathroom and a study, with a private balcony to the principal bedroom. The first floor can instead be three bedrooms, or two bedrooms with a study, and the family bathroom can be split into a separate WC and bath. On the medium and large terraces an extra bedroom can be built over the void.

Parking is a hardstand in the front setback with an optional carport, so there is no garage and no basement. The roof is a single plane sloping north at 5 degrees with room for about 32 square metres of solar panels over each home, and it extends over the front and rear to shade windows and balconies.

Both base patterns are drawn below, first the low and mid rise housing area version on an 18 by 27.78 metre lot, then the version for the rest of NSW on a 21 by 28.57 metre lot. The two differ mainly in setbacks and in parking: one car space per dwelling is required outside low and mid rise housing areas.

Terraces come in three widths and the three homes on a lot do not have to match. The official design page gives an average floor area of about 93 square metres per dwelling. Dwelling depth is 12.8 metres in every version, so the extra area comes from width.

The small and medium terraces meet the Australian Building Codes Board Livable Housing Design Standard, which is the silver level of the old Livable Housing guidelines. The large terrace is drawn to the voluntary beyond minimum standard, the old gold level, so a household can stay in it as mobility changes.

The pattern is a kit with rules, not one fixed building. Eight dwelling combinations are published for low and mid rise housing areas and five for the rest of NSW, each with its own minimum lot size and width. The plan can be mirrored, and several siting options are mirrored versions of one another, which the drawings mark as similar.

Orientation is the point of the design. The entry, the roof and the openings all shift so that living areas and the main private open space face north whichever way the street runs. On a south facing lot the entry and porch relocate to the south and the southern bedroom gains a 1.8 metre balcony.

Bigger sites are covered too. The published order of operations for a 24 metre or 40 metre wide site allows combinations of up to five terraces in a row, with a north facing yard at least 8 metres deep on a north to south site or 5 metres on an east to west site. The development standards cap an unbroken street frontage at 45 metres.

The design verification statement lodged with the application has to record every option chosen, and adaptations cannot go beyond the published set.

Three palettes are published. Palette 01 uses cream face brick with clear sealed vertical timber cladding and lining, timber veneer cabinets and a stainless steel benchtop. Palette 02 uses rendered brick with corrugated zincalume cladding, painted timber lining, laminate cabinets and a porcelain benchtop. Palette 03 uses red face brick with fibre cement sheet cladding, painted cabinets and a laminate benchtop with a solid timber edge.

All three share honed concrete on the ground floor, cork upstairs, painted plasterboard walls and solid timber door frames and skirtings. Choose the palette that suits the street you are building in, and check the licensed technical documentation before substituting anything.

Dudils screens lot size and orientation to identify patterns that could work. It does not complete a planning eligibility assessment. Before buying a site, taking an option on it or buying the pattern licence, check the current State and council mapping and get professional advice.

Complying development is not available on bush fire prone land, even at the lowest rating of BAL 12.5, or on excluded flood prone land. Heritage items and heritage conservation areas are outside the pattern book pathway. Landslip risk land, registered easements that cross the proposed building area, coastal hazard land, foreshore land and unsewered land also need to be ruled out, and a battle axe lot has no street frontage to build this pattern against.

Get a contour survey early. The technical drawings adapt the pattern to a fall of 1.4 metres from front to back and to a cross fall of about 1.0 metre in a low and mid rise housing area or 1.24 metres elsewhere before boundary retaining is needed. Dudils screens slope from the national elevation model, which is indicative and not a survey. The development standards page also notes that internal stairs and level changes can absorb up to 2.3 metres front to back and 1.2 metres side to side, so confirm which figure applies to your site with your designer.

Think about your neighbours to the south. A two storey terrace row on the northern side of an existing house can cut its winter sun, and every application has to demonstrate that a living room window of an adjoining dwelling keeps more than 3 hours of sun on 21 June. Driveways must sit at least 6 metres from an intersection and keep the pedestrian sight line clear, which can rule out a corner siting.

We recommend asking Good Architect to undertake a site feasibility study before buying the land or the pattern licence. The study tests the planning constraints, the contours and the shadows, and draws the pattern on your actual block before you commit.

These are the numeric controls specific to this pattern. They apply where it is proposed as pattern book complying development under the Codes SEPP, and the left hand figure is for low and mid rise housing areas.

The NSW Government sets the licence fee. Licence from $1,000 per lot covers one site. On 6 August 2026 the official pattern book shop showed $1,000 as a subsidised price for the first six months and listed this design as sold out, so check the shop for the current price and availability before you plan around it.

The licence buys the technical drawings in PDF and DWG formats, BASIX guidance for the pattern, an editable design verification statement, the landscape guide and a unique identification number for your application. Files are supplied electronically and the download window is limited, so download and archive them as soon as they arrive.

You then engage an architect or an accredited designer to adapt the drawings to your site. That person signs the design verification statement confirming the proposal keeps the pattern's fixed features and stays inside the published options, and they must give their registration number. An architect signing it must be on the NSW Register of Architects.

Approval is a complying development certificate under Part 3BA of the Codes SEPP. Certifiers have 10 days to determine a pattern book certificate, against 20 days for ordinary residential complying development. You still need a survey, a landscape plan prepared against the NSW Housing Pattern Book Landscape Guide, a stormwater design by an engineer, a driveway crossing approval, a waste management plan and a BASIX certificate supported by a NatHERS assessment.

The pattern drawings are an indicative design for planning purposes, not construction drawings. After approval you still need full construction documentation that complies with the National Construction Code and the ABCB Livable Housing Design Standard. Start with a Good Architect site feasibility study so you know the pattern works on the block before you buy the land or the licence.