Zoning Bylaw Rewrite

The current Zoning Bylaw has 86 special modifications, and each one has been carefully reviewed in the development of the proposed Zoning Bylaw. For each special modification, we assessed whether it should be deleted, modified, or kept substantially the same. Special modifications are proposed to be deleted if they are more restrictive than the standard zone or if they are no longer warranted in relation to the OCP. Special modifications are proposed to be kept or modified if they remain relevant and do not conflict with the OCP.

In total, 40 special modifications are carried forward into the proposed bylaw. Additionally, 6 new special modifications have been introduced to support specific OCP policies or to address situations where standard zone conversion is not appropriate for a particular site.

All retained special modifications have been rewritten for consistency and clarity, ensuring they are easier to understand and apply.

A complete list of the special modifications from the current Zoning Bylaw, including the proposed action (delete, modify, or keep) and the reason, and all newly introduced modifications, is provided in the List of Special Modifications document.

A proposed Zoning Bylaw will be introduced to the City Planning Committee on October 6.

The proposed Zoning Bylaw was developed following extensive public engagement over the past two years.

Read a What We Heard Report from the most recent round of public engagement here.

Read about the big changes in the proposed Zoning Bylaw here.

See a comparison between the current Zoning Bylaw and the proposed Zoning Bylaw here.

Members of the public can provide input on the proposed Zoning Bylaw be emailing publicinput@whitehorse.ca.

Residents will also have the opportunity to provide input at a Public Hearing later this fall (date to be confirmed).

We will update this page once the dates for the Council process have been confirmed, including the date for the Public Hearing.

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Thank you to everyone who participated in the second round of engagement we conducted between May 16, 2025 and June 20, 2025 on the Draft Zoning Bylaw. We are excited to release the Engagement Summary Report which summarizes the input we received.

It is anticipated that a comprehensive Proposed Zoning Bylaw will be ready for Council consideration by October 2025. You will have an opportunity to provide input on the Proposed Zoning Bylaw at an upcoming Public Hearing at City Hall. Dates for the Council process, including the Public Hearing, will be provided as they become available.

The survey is now closed. Thank you to everyone who completed the survey!

We are now preparing a What We Heard report summarizing the input received through the survey and open houses.

Your feedback, along with interested party feedback and best practices data, will be used to inform the draft Zoning Bylaw to help the City finalize the bylaw for Council review and approval.

Local builders, developers, and property owners are invited to participate in a Small-Scale Multi-Unit Development Design Workshop hosted by the City of Whitehorse and Kobayashi + Zedda Architects.

Developer Workshop
Date: Monday, January 20
Time: 8 am to 12 pm
Location: Kwanlin Dün Cultural Centre – Lu Zil Män / Multi-Purpose Room (1171 1st Avenue)
Register Here

General Public Workshop
Date: Tuesday, January 28
Time: 5 pm to 9 pm
Location: Baked Café (100 Main Street)
Register Here

In April 2024, Council adopted Bylaw 2024-16, a bylaw to amend the Zoning Bylaw to enable a wider range of opportunities for residential development within the City’s neighbourhoods. This included permitting up to four units per lot on all urban residential lots.

The workshops are an opportunity for builders and property owners to learn more about these changes, and design considerations, and workshop a small-scale multi-unit housing design with local architects and City staff. Attendees will be able to workshop their own designs and plans, with the local architects and City staff available to assist and answer questions. Attendees will also have the option of working on a sample design. To have materials prepared for your design, please submit the materials you have here one week before the date you wish to attend.

Kobayashi + Zedda architects will be facilitating the workshops and will lead a presentation on considerations for the development of small-scale multi-unit housing in Whitehorse and facilitate the following workshop.

The General Public workshop is intended for individuals interested in developing dwelling units on their own property.

The Developer Workshop is intended for businesses and organizations who undertake development as a profession, including: builders, land developers, governments, non-profit organizations, and development professionals (e.g. architects, designers, etc.).

Light refreshments will be provided. Attendance is limited, please register in advance to secure your attendance.

To host these workshops, The City of Whitehorse received financing from CMHC, however, the views expressed are the personal views of the author and CMHC accepts no responsibility for them.

Thank you to those who were able to attend the webinar(s) for a Guide for Developing Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing. Please take a few minutes to complete our exit survey and let us know to what degree the webinar was useful for you. We would also appreciate feedback on the topics covered, and if you would like any future events and materials to cover additional topics or certain topics in more depth.

Exit Survey Link

If you were not able to attend or would like to review the webinar, the webinar recordings and slide deck are available at the links below and on the left of this page under Documents and Videos.

Webinar Slide Deck

Webinar General Public

Webinar Professional Developers

If you have any questions or would like to provide feedback directly, please email planning@whitehorse.ca

The City has published a Guide for Developing Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing. The guide is intended to communicate the new zoning changes for anyone interested in adding additional dwelling units to an urban residential lot.

This guide is also intended to highlight various site and building design considerations that must be addressed when developing up to four dwelling units on an urban residential lot.

This is a living document and will be updated as new regulations come into effect. Notably, a new Zoning Bylaw will come into effect in 2025. The names of zones may change and/or some zones may consolidate into one zone. Development regulations may also undergo further changes

In April 2024, Council adopted Bylaw 2024-16, a bylaw to amend the Zoning Bylaw to enable a wider range of opportunities for residential development within the City’s neighbourhoods.

To promote these changes and assist prospective developers with the implementation of these new regulations, the City staff will present a Guide for Developing Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing.

The guide will include a summary of the new zoning regulations, design considerations for implementation, such as development regulations, building code and engineering regulations, fees and charges, potential unit configurations and resources available to assist developers.

City staff will give a presentation summarizing the contents of the document and be available for questions and comments after the presentation

Anyone is welcome to attend either or both webinars. The Professional Developers webinar will be geared towards individuals and companies currently working in the development industry. As such, the attendee's knowledge of certain development regulations may be assumed by presenters.

The General Public webinar will be geared towards individuals who have never undertaken a major development project (for example, developing a dwelling unit).

Each webinar will be recorded, and recordings will be made available to the public as soon as possible.

Thank you to everyone who participated in engagement on Short-Term Rentals (STRs) we conducted in August and September. We are excited to release the Engagement Summary Report which summarizes the input we received from over 1900 survey responses and 10 stakeholder interviews. Feedback provided through this engagement along with best practices research and a technical review will inform the development of recommendations for a potential regulations to manage STRs in Whitehorse.

The survey is now closed. Thank you to everyone who completed the survey – we received over 1900 responses!

We are now preparing a What We Heard report summarizing the input received through the survey. The results will be provided later in October.

Your feedback, along with interested party feedback and best practices data, will be used to inform the draft Zoning Bylaw, including any proposed new short-term rental regulations. The draft bylaw will then be presented in late 2024/early 2025, for public and interested party feedback, to help the City finalize the bylaw for Council review and approval.