A new build’s utility approvals aren’t one filing — they’re several, running through different instruments and different regulators, and the one that gets missed most often is the one buried inside a site plan agreement rather than filed as its own permit.
Key takeaways
On a site that requires site plan control, servicing obligations don’t typically show up as their own free-standing permit. They’re written into the site plan agreement itself, alongside “approved building location and grading plan, required landscaping and its maintenance, parking layout and access points,” per what the agreement typically contains. That means the servicing scope — connections, sizing, stormwater management — is negotiated and locked in as part of the same approval that covers landscaping and access, not as a separate utility-only sign-off.
That agreement doesn’t expire when the buildings are finished. “A site plan agreement is registered on title and stays with the land,” and “ongoing maintenance obligations… can continue to apply well after the original construction is finished.” A purchaser of a completed site inherits whatever servicing and maintenance obligations the original agreement created — a title search catches this; assuming a completed building has no open servicing obligations does not.
Because servicing works are frequently underground or otherwise not independently permitted, municipalities protect their own interest with security. “Municipalities often require security, such as a letter of credit, to ensure those works are actually completed as agreed,” and developers must “complete specified works according to approved plans before or during construction,” per the same source. Practically, that letter of credit is the leverage that keeps servicing from being the item quietly deferred to “after occupancy” — it isn’t released until the municipality is satisfied the works are in.
The site plan control tool itself is explicit about what it can and can’t reach: municipalities can control “access for pedestrians and vehicles, walkways, lighting, waste facilities, landscaping, drainage, exterior design,” and can apply conditions on “road widenings, property access, and off-street parking and loading facilities,” per Ontario’s site plan control guide — drainage sits squarely inside that list, which is why stormwater servicing so often gets negotiated through the site plan process rather than through a standalone environmental permit.
A building permit is also, on its own, one of the specific actions a municipal development charge can attach to: the Development Charges Act, 1997 lists “the issuing of a permit under the Building Code Act, 1992” alongside a site plan or subdivision approval as an action a development charge by-law may attach to (s. 2(2)(g)) — a separate financial obligation from the servicing clause buried in the site plan agreement itself. A municipality cannot simply set that charge by fiat, either: it has to be calculated and adopted through a background study process the Act itself sets out (s. 10), which is why the number is disclosed rather than negotiated case by case.
Electrical service is its own approval, filed to the Electrical Safety Authority rather than folded into either the building permit or the site plan agreement — “the Ontario Electrical Safety Code… requires almost all electrical work be reported to the Electrical Safety Authority by filing a notification of work,” per ESA’s own guidance, covered in full in our companion piece on electrical permits and inspection scheduling.
Gas service and other technical-safety utility connections sit under TSSA’s delegated authority, but there is genuinely no free, citable TSSA figure to quote here — TSSA’s own site loads mostly navigation, with no reachable fee or timeline page found for fuels connections. The honest position for a preconstruction budget is to name TSSA as the regulator and confirm the current fee and timeline directly with them or the local gas utility, rather than assume a number that isn’t published anywhere citable. That gap in what’s publicly quotable is itself worth flagging in a budget package: a line item marked “confirm directly with regulator” is more useful to whoever reviews the estimate than a guessed figure that looks precise but isn’t sourced.
A worked example
A developer buys a site plan-controlled infill lot from a previous owner who completed construction three years earlier. The purchase agreement doesn’t mention any outstanding servicing obligation, and the developer assumes the site plan agreement closed out when the building received its occupancy permit. A title search, run before closing, turns up the original site plan agreement still registered against the property — including a stormwater management maintenance clause requiring the on-site detention system to be inspected and cleared annually, an obligation that runs with the land rather than with the original developer.
Because the agreement stays registered on title, the new owner inherits that annual obligation regardless of who built the original system. Confirming servicing status through a title search before closing — rather than assuming a completed building carries no open site plan obligations — is what catches this kind of clause before it becomes a surprise maintenance bill the year after purchase.
Usually not as a stand-alone filing where site plan control applies — it’s typically written into the site plan agreement itself, alongside grading, landscaping and access, per what that agreement contains.
Not necessarily. The agreement “is registered on title and stays with the land,” and ongoing maintenance obligations can continue well after construction is finished — which is why a title search matters before buying a completed site.
No. Electrical work runs through a separate ESA notification of work, independent of both the building permit and the site plan agreement — see electrical permits and inspection scheduling for how that filing works.
Gas and other technical-safety utility connections sit under TSSA’s delegated authority, but TSSA publishes no free, citable fee or timeline for this specific work — confirm the current requirement directly with TSSA or the local gas utility rather than budgeting an assumed figure.
The municipality, once it is satisfied the works described in the site plan agreement are actually complete and pass inspection — the letter of credit or other security is the mechanism that keeps servicing from being quietly deferred past occupancy.
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