Knowledge Base

Many of the resource areas protected by the Wetlands Protection Act and the City's wetlands protection ordinance have a 100' buffer zone. This buffer zone is measured from the edge of the resource area, such as a bordering vegetated wetland, outward 100'. The City's ordinance expands this distance in some areas, particularly along our water supplies where the buffer zone is 200'. The City's ordinance also breaks this buffer zone down into other zones of protection, namely the 25'-No Disturbance Zone ("NDZ") and the 50'-No Build Zone ("NBZ"). The NDZ is protected in its natural state as a buffer to the resource area. Between the limits of the NDZ and NBZ, some disturbance is allowed. However, new houses and buildings most often have to be constructed outside the NBZ. Buffer zones do not receive the level of "protection" afforded wetland resource areas. However, activities proposed within these buffer zones are subject to review and regulation by the Commission.