Fencing advice for Great Yarmouth homes
How high can your fence be? The 2 metre rule explained
Before you order tall panels with a trellis on top, it is worth five minutes on the rules. Getting the height wrong can mean a letter from the council and a fence that has to be cut down.
What follows is taken from the Planning Portal's guidance for England, which we read while writing this. It is a summary. Your own council has the final say on your own address.
The two limits
You do not need planning permission to put up, alter or take down a fence, wall or gate, as long as it stays inside two height limits.
- One metre if the fence is next to a road used by vehicles, or next to the footpath of such a road.
- Two metres anywhere else.
Height is measured from ground level. The Planning Portal's page on fences, gates and garden walls sets this out. People call it the 2 metre rule.
What that means in feet
Two metres is about six feet six inches. A standard six foot panel is 1.83 metres. On a six inch gravel board it comes to about 1.98 metres, just inside the limit. On a one foot gravel board it goes over.
So the common back garden fence, a six foot panel on a short gravel board, fits. A seven foot fence does not. Seven feet is about 2.13 metres, and that needs planning permission.
One metre is about three feet three inches. That is the limit along the front of most houses, where the garden meets the pavement.
When the limits do not help you
- Listed buildings. If your house is listed, or the fence would form a boundary with a listed building next door, you need permission.
- Rights taken away. Some homes have had the right to put up fences removed by a planning condition or by what is called an article 4 direction. Open-plan front gardens are the usual example.
- An existing fence that is already too tall. You can keep it, but you cannot make it taller.
- Conservation areas. You may need permission to take a fence, wall or gate down.
Deeds can carry limits of their own. A covenant that says no fence at the front, or none above a set height, still binds you where planning would allow it.
Trellis and slopes
The Planning Portal's page does not treat trellis as a special case. The safe reading is that a trellis fixed on top of a fence counts towards its height. If panel plus trellis comes to more than two metres, ask the council first.
Sloping gardens raise a fair question: measured from whose ground? The guidance says ground level and no more. Where your garden sits higher or lower than next door's, ring the planning office before you build right up to the limit.
Who to ask around Great Yarmouth
For most addresses the planning authority is Great Yarmouth Borough Council. In those parts of the borough that fall inside the Broads, it is the Broads Authority. Either can tell you if permission is needed, and both would sooner be asked before the fence goes up than after.
The old town has many historic buildings, from the Rows behind South Quay to its Georgian and Victorian streets. If you live in or beside one of them, check for listing before you change a boundary.
When you know your limit, tell the fencer. They can set the gravel board and panel height to suit. See fence panels in Great Yarmouth, or garden gates, which follow the same limits.
Common questions
What is the 2m fence rule?
It is the planning limit for fences in England. A fence, wall or gate can be up to two metres high without planning permission, or one metre if it is beside a road used by vehicles. Listed buildings, and homes where the right has been removed, are exceptions.
Is it legal to have a 7ft fence in the UK?
Only with planning permission, going by the guidance for England. Seven feet is about 2.13 metres, which is over the two metre limit. The page we read covers England, so check the rules for Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland with the planning body there.
Can I put up a 2 metre fence in my front garden?
Not beside the road without permission. Where the fence runs next to a road used by vehicles, or its footpath, the limit is one metre. Further back, along a side boundary, two metres is allowed.
Check the height, then get the price
A fence built over the limit without permission leaves you open to being told to lower it, and then you pay for it twice. Five minutes with a tape measure now is cheap by comparison.
Say what height you want and where in Great Yarmouth you are. The price comes with no bill attached.