Stand-Alone House Design Ngā Whare Tūwehe

1. Site Design 2. Placing the Building 3. Street to Front Door 4. Outdoor Spaces 5. Accommodating Cars 6. The Building

Parking beside the house Print


​​Design Checklist

  1. The house is more prominent than the garage​​.

Overview


​​​​​​​​Garages and parking are typically located to one side of the house. The critical design consideration in this arrangement is the width of the site. ​

On a narrow site, the garage becomes a more dominant part of the building, and the driveway has more impact on the street. Therefore, garages should be designed to be as narrow and visually recessive as possible.​​

Better Design Practice

Break up the form of larger garages by: 
  • Using two staggered single garage doors instead of one large double garage door to serve double garage spaces
  • Considering utilising a single garage and an open carport instead of a double garage


Where possible locate driveways and access ways on shaded areas of the site, reserving sunnier areas for outdoor living spaces and habitable rooms of the house.


Minimise the width of the driveway where it crosses over the footpath.
Consider sharing driveway crossovers (lowered kerbs) with adjacent developments. ​


Where a site has two road frontages, consider which is most appropriate to provide access.
Usually it is better to provide access off the quieter street, but providing it off the street with the longest boundary can make it easier to successfully integrate parking into the house design. ​


Minimise any onsite parking other than the garage or driveway, particularly at the front of the house.
If additional parking is provided there, it should be screened from the street with low fencing and landscaping.​

Rules of Thumb

Garages should not be more than half of the width of the house, and no more than 6.2m wide.

Double (side by side) garages should always be avoided on lots less than 7.5m wide, and should preferably be used only on lots that are 12.5m wide or more.

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