After a new home is constructed, the majority of home owners want to construct a fence for their own enjoyment.

One of the first steps is to decide where the fence is to be built. The City of Calgary has a pamphlet called “Fences”. It is available to be picked up at the City of Calgary Planning Department at 800 Macleod Trail S. on the 3rd Floor. Their phone number is 268-5351. It specifies the maximum height a fence can be built at different locations. The other concern is to determine the location of the property line. In Alberta, the property line is marked by iron posts, which are about 1″ in diameter and approximately 3′ long. An iron post may be buried a few inches in the ground, but sometimes it can be over one foot deep.

It is normally some distance away from the concrete curb or sidewalk at the front of the house. The following is a guideline as to where the approximate location of the survey post should be.

LOCATION Distance from back of Concrete
Normal residential road with sidewalk 4.0 feet
Normal residential road without sidewalk 7.5 feet
Major road with separate sidewalk 1.0 feet
Major road with sidewalk 10.0 feet

The easiest way to locate the iron survey post is to rent a metal locator from an equipment rental business(hyper link back to our Links section on the main page.

Obviously, the most desirable way to construct a fence is to share the labour and expenses with your neighbor.  You can construct the fence right on the property line.  If that is not possible, we recommend that you construct your fence within your property.  In other words, build the fence one or two inches inside your property line.  This will avoid any future problems with your neighbor.  Please do not destroy or move the iron post while you are constructing the fence, as it is illegal to do so and also may cost you extra when you need a survey done.

Quite often the survey post marking the corner of the property is destroyed or disturbed during construction.  If that is the case, you may have to engage the services of an Alberta Land Surveyor to locate or mark the boundary for the fence line construction.

Should you require our services to determine property lines for you, please have the legal description of your property available when you contact our office (revise this link to link to our contact section).

This information is supplied as a matter of professional courtesy.  Lovse Surveys Ltd. cannot be held responsible for work not performed by our company.