Industrial Zoning Reference
Surrey industrial zoning, explained for industrial users.
Surrey's industrial land runs on Bylaw 12000's IL, IB, IH and IA series, separating light impact industrial, designed business parks, heavy industry and agro-industrial processing. The complication in practice is Campbell Heights and other master-planned parks, where many parcels carry site-specific Comprehensive Development (CD) zones based on the IB and IL frameworks rather than the standard codes.
The Industrial Zones
Every industrial zone in Surrey
Surrey's workhorse general industrial zone: light impact industry, transportation industry, warehouses, distribution centres, recycling depots, automotive service and body work, with limited office and service uses.
Light impact industry held to a high design standard: warehouses and distribution centres with narrowly limited service and office uses.
Comprehensively designed industrial business parks: light impact industry (including wholesale and retail of products produced on site), offices, general service uses and warehousing.
Business-park variants with high design standards as part of comprehensive designs: light impact industry, warehouses, distribution centres and limited offices; IB-3 adds liquor manufacturing with capped tasting lounges.
Accommodates all industrial uses including high impact industry: abattoirs, asphalt and tar, cement, lime and gypsum, chemical plants, fat rendering and fertilizer manufacturing, with incidental sales.
Industries that process agricultural products or serve agriculture: bottling, packaging, canning and freezing of bakery, dairy, fruit and egg products and similar operations.
Master-planned industrial areas, notably much of Campbell Heights, sit on parcel-specific CD zones built from the IB and IL frameworks. Each CD bylaw is its own document.
Always confirm the specific CD bylaw for the parcel on COSMOS; the base zone series does not tell you the rules on a CD site.
Recent changes: The industrial zone series is stable, with recent city-wide amending bylaws layered on top (including 2026 amendments) alongside the provincial housing-legislation restructuring that renamed Surrey's residential series. Office Employment zones (O1, O2) exist in the current consolidation for employment-land contexts.
What This Means in Practice
Zoning is the first check, not the last.
- In Campbell Heights, assume the parcel is CD-zoned until proven otherwise and read the actual CD bylaw; two neighbouring buildings can carry different permitted-use lists.
- A zone listing a use as permitted is the start, not the finish: conditional uses, accessory-use limits, outdoor storage rules and site-specific conditions all live in the schedule fine print.
- Parking and loading are usually governed by a separate parking bylaw or section; a building can be correctly zoned and still fail your trailer or fleet requirements.
- Many individual properties carry site-specific or comprehensive-development zoning instead of a standard code, so always confirm the actual zone on the parcel, not the area around it.
- Confirm current regulations with the municipal planning department before committing; bylaws are amended continuously.
If you are evaluating a building or a site in Surrey and want a read on whether the zoning actually supports your operation, or which zones to target for a requirement, I do this work as part of every assignment.
This page is a plain-language summary of Surrey’s industrial zoning prepared by Samuel Brahem, Industrial Sales and Leasing, NAI Commercial (BC) Ltd., for general orientation only. It is not legal advice and is not a substitute for the bylaw itself. Zoning bylaws change; always confirm current regulations, permitted uses and site-specific conditions with the official bylaw and the municipal planning department before making decisions. Last verified against the official source on September 14, 2026.