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Sydney Decks

Sheet 00 · the site plan

Planning a deck in Sydney

What your deck sits over, and what it sits beside. A deck is drawn on its own: bearers, joists, boards. It is built on a block that already holds a sewer line, a pool fence, a power circuit, a neighbour’s lot, a house with a history and somewhere for the rain to go. This guide takes each of those in turn, from the official pages that set the rules.

A deck drawn as a framing plan, with what surrounds it Chalk drawing of a deck frame of bearers and joists beside a house. A sewer line runs under the deck to a maintenance hole with a clearance ring. A pool and its fence sit to the right. A cable runs from the house to a light at the deck corner. A lot boundary runs down the left side. Rain runs from a downpipe to a pit and on to the street. the house bearers and joists sewer line pool pool fence light pit to the street commonthe lot not to scale 123456
The deck and its neighbours, numbered to the six guides below.
  1. The pipe underneath
  2. The pool fence beside it
  3. Power and light
  4. The strata boundary
  5. A house with a heritage listing
  6. Where the rain goes

A guide to the ground around a deck

Sydney Decks is a guide to the things a deck in Sydney sits over or beside, written and published by Dotto. Each rule on these pages comes from the body that sets it: Sydney Water, the NSW Government, Building Commission NSW, Heritage NSW or a council. Each page lists the sources it drew on at its foot, so you can read the rule in its owner’s words.

Most of these rules protect someone else. Sydney Water needs safe access to its pipes at any hour so it can manage incidents without delay. A pool barrier has to be child-resistant. In a strata scheme, gardens, pipes and external walls are often common property, shared by everyone in the building. Knowing these rules early is easier than meeting them after the posts are in.

Weathered grey timber deck boards laid on a diagonal, with nail holes and one shorter replacement board.
Boards are the part everyone sees. The guides below are about what lies around and beneath them. Photo by PublicDomainPictures on Pixabay

The cut list: six things a deck meets

What each guide starts from
No.What the deck meetsThe first thing to knowGuide
1A Sydney Water pipePlans for building near Sydney Water’s pipes go to Sydney Water first, since building, digging and landscaping can harm its pipes or block its way to them. Building near Sydney Water pipes
2A pool barrierIn the NSW Government’s words: “If the swimming pool barrier is modified or altered (this may include house and yard renovations), then the current Swimming Pools Act 1992, Swimming Pools Regulation 2018 and Australian Standard AS1926.1-2012 is applied and previous exemptions cease.” Decks beside a pool
3Power and lightingIn NSW you need an electrical licence or certificate for any electrical wiring work, regardless of what the work costs. Power and lighting outdoors
4A strata schemeNSW strata rules sort renovations into cosmetic work, minor renovations and major renovations, and only the owners corporation can approve a major one. A deck in a strata scheme
5A heritage listingHeritage NSW says listing “provides advance knowledge about the approvals needed to make alterations”. Decks on heritage properties
6The rainRain has no place in the sewer: Sydney Water forbids letting any of it into your property’s wastewater pipes. Drainage under a deck

Before the first post hole

Four things to look up before anyone digs, each taken from the page of the body that runs it.

  1. Find out what is underground

    Before any digging, Sydney Water points owners to Before You Dig Australia (BYDA) to learn what pipes, cables and other services lie under the site, and its own plans come through BYDA at no charge.

  2. Find out whether the house is listed

    Heritage NSW points to the State Heritage Inventory as the place to find out if a place, building or site is heritage listed.

  3. If there is a pool, find its certificates

    The NSW Swimming Pool Register is searchable by address, and a registered pool shows its Certificate of Registration and its Certificate of Compliance or Non-Compliance there.

  4. If it is strata, read the by-laws

    Each scheme’s by-laws set out which changes need approval and the way to ask for it, so the NSW Government suggests reading them before any renovation starts.

Where this guide stops

This guide stays with what lies around and under a deck. For whether the deck itself needs planning approval, NSW Planning’s page on exempt development is the place to start; it names decks among its examples. NSW Planning: exempt development.