Fence laws in Bowie, Maryland
What the Bowie municipal code says about fences, one topic at a time, with the section number and a link to the document behind every line. Where Bowie sets no rule of its own, the Maryland rule is shown in its place and marked as such.
Fence laws in Bowie, Maryland, question by question
The short version
- Who pays on the line
- Bowie bans the front yard fence rather than limiting it, and the answer turns on which yard the fence is in and how the lot sits against its neighbors. The figure is 0 feet, for setback required from a property line between two privately owned parcels.
- How tall
- Bowie states its height rule as a location rule, and the answer turns on whether the fence is over six feet and which yard it stands in. The figure is 6 feet, for height above which a fence has to leave the required yard.
- Permits
- Section 26-2 names a permit only for the fences it is making an exception for, and the answer turns on where the fence is and what is being asked for.
- Pool barriers
- Maryland has statewide pool and spa standards that adopt the 2024 International Swimming Pool and Spa Code.
- Spite fences
- Bowie has no spite fence statute. The chapters that were read are listed below. Cities and counties decide this one.
- Measured from what
- Bowie leaves the measuring rule to the legislative body of each county and municipal corporation.
- Corner lots
- The purpose clause names the corner problem directly, saying the fence restrictions exist among other things to prevent the obstruction or reduction, by man-made structures, of visibility at corners and intersections for drivers and pedestrians, and the answer turns on where the side street building restriction line sits and what is across the street. The figure is 15 feet, for distance a rear yard fence keeps from the side street property line on those corner lots.
- Retaining walls
- Bowie leaves retaining walls to the 2021 International Residential Code and the 2021 International Building Code. It reaches one and two family homes under the International Residential Code, and other buildings under the International Building Code only.
- Materials
- The city does its material work in the definition rather than in the rules, and the answer turns on whether the thing is a fence at all, and whether it stands in Huntington.
- Livestock
- Bowie leaves the lawful fence specification to each county.
Who owns the fence between two properties in Bowie?
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Bowie answers this, but the answer changes depending on which yard the fence is in and how the lot sits against its neighbors.
Bowie bans the front yard fence rather than limiting it. Fences are prohibited between the front building line of any residential dwelling and any publicly dedicated street, private street or parking area, and the only exception anywhere in the city is for dwellings in the Huntington section built before 1960. Behind that line a fence is allowed on the property line between two or more privately owned parcels, so no setback is required from a neighbor. Two rear yard cases carry real distances. Where the rear lot line continues the front yard line of the adjacent lot, a rear yard fence has to be set back twenty five feet from the property line. On a corner lot with a twenty five foot building restriction line, a rear yard fence has to stay at least fifteen feet from the property line along the side street. Fences in a utility or drainage easement need written authorization from the easement holder, and the city takes no responsibility for replacing one it has to remove.
Except as hereinafter provided, fences are prohibited between the front building line of any residential dwelling and any publicly dedicated street, private street or parking area.
The answer turns on which yard the fence is in and how the lot sits against its neighbors.
- in front of the building line
- No fence.
- a line between two private parcels
- On the line. 0 ft
- a rear line that continues a neighbor front yard
- Twenty five feet back. 25 ft
- a utility or drainage easement
- Written authorization from the holder.
Also on fences on the property line in Bowie
- set in state lawMaryland has no state rule splitting the cost of a fence on the line. It gives the whole subject to the counties. A county may set rules for how a fence is built and kept up, set a way for neighbors to enforce their rights over a fence, and let an owner who is not the one at fault put a lien on the property for repairs. Neither the property article nor the farming article mentions fences at all. Md. Code, Local Gov’t § 10-318Maryland · Statute
How tall can a fence be in Bowie?
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Bowie answers this, but the answer changes depending on whether the fence is over six feet and which yard it stands in.
Bowie states its height rule as a location rule. Fences and walls, including retaining walls, more than six feet high may not be located in any required yard and have to meet the setback requirements for main buildings, so going over six feet does not need permission, it needs the fence to move back to where the house would stand. In practice that makes six feet the working maximum for a fence on a lot line. The other height in the section belongs to the one place a front or side street fence is allowed at all: a Huntington fence on a pre-1960 dwelling may not exceed four feet. Nothing in the section states a maximum for a rear yard fence under six feet, and the definition of fence sets four feet as the point above which a purely decorative structure stops being decorative and becomes a fence.
Fences and walls (including retaining walls) more than six feet high may not be located in any required yard and shall meet the setback requirements for main buildings.
The answer turns on whether the fence is over six feet and which yard it stands in.
- a fence up to six feet
- It may stand in a required yard. 6 ft
- a fence over six feet
- Out of the yard, at the building setback.
- a Huntington front or side street fence
- Four feet. 4 ft
- a decorative structure
- Not a fence at all under four feet, within limits.
Also on fence height in Bowie
- no rule, documents checkedMaryland sets no limit on how tall a fence at a house can be, and its own laws assume the limit comes from somewhere else. The Land Use Article lets a town pass a local law allowing a fence taller than the height state, regional or county zoning would otherwise require, which only makes sense if those local rules are where the limit lives. The Local Government Article separately gives counties power over how a fence is built. Height in Maryland is county and town zoning. Md. Code, Land Use § 25-303Maryland · Statute
Do I need a permit for a fence in Bowie?
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Bowie answers this, but the answer changes depending on where the fence is and what is being asked for.
Section 26-2 names a permit only for the fences it is making an exception for. A Huntington front yard fence and a Huntington side street yard fence are each subject to a City building permit, spelled out as a condition alongside the four foot height and the material list. Everywhere else the route past the section is a variance from the Board of Appeals under the procedures and standards in Section 26-15, and variances granted before Ordinance O-3-23 took effect stay in force. One more route exists and it is temporary: a fence may stand in front of a model home during the marketing stage of a new development, provided it comes down as soon as the house stops being a sales model, provided it is conspicuously posted as being for marketing only, and provided both the sales contract and the development covenants say plainly that the code prohibits the fence as displayed.
The Board of Appeals may allow a variance from the strict application of this section according to the procedures and standards set forth in § 26-15.
The answer turns on where the fence is and what is being asked for.
- a Huntington street fence
- A City building permit.
- anything else the section bars
- A variance from the Board of Appeals.
- a model home fence
- Allowed while marketing, posted and disclosed.
- a fence lawful in 1992
- Nonconforming, and repairable within limits.
Also on permits in Bowie
- set in state lawMaryland adopts the 2021 International Building Code, the 2021 International Residential Code for one and two family homes, and the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code as the code for the whole state. Maryland did not change the list of work that needs no permit, so the model code list applies as written. That list is model code text and is not published on a Maryland state site, so no fence height figure is quoted here. COMAR 09.12.51.04Maryland · Building code
Pool fence requirements in Bowie
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Maryland answers this in its own law. The words that do it are quoted below.
Maryland has statewide pool and spa standards that adopt the 2024 International Swimming Pool and Spa Code. They apply to a pool whose permit application reached the local office on or after December 31, 2023. Maryland wrote its own barrier heights only for the public pool classes, and left the barrier rules for every other pool as the model code wrote them. So the height for a pool at a house lives in that model code and not in Maryland text.
This one is Maryland law, not Bowie law. All Maryland findings
The 2024 International Swimming Pool and Spa Code (ISPSC), International Code Council, is incorporated by reference.
Spite fence laws in Bowie
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Bowie law has no rule about this. The chapters that were read are listed below. Cities and counties decide it instead.
Maryland has no spite fence law. The property, farming, local government and land use articles were all searched, and none of them has a rule about a fence raised out of spite, or a height that triggers one. The only fence powers in Maryland law are the ones given to counties and towns, so a limit on a spite fence in Maryland is a local rule.
This one is Maryland law, not Bowie law. All Maryland findings
Documents read before writing that:
- Md. Code, Local Gov’t § 10-318Maryland General Assembly
- Md. Code, Land Use § 25-303Maryland General Assembly
How fence height is measured in Bowie
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Bowie does not set this. It leaves it to the legislative body of each county and municipal corporation.
Maryland gives fence height to local government twice and never says what it is measured from. The Land Use Article lets a legislative body set the height, number of stories and size of buildings and other structures. Another section lets a town inside the regional district pass a law allowing a fence taller than the limit state, regional or county zoning would otherwise set, which treats that height as a number somebody else already wrote. Neither section says whether the number is read from natural ground or from a finished yard.
This one is Maryland law, not Bowie law. All Maryland findings
To promote the health, safety, and general welfare of the community, a legislative body may regulate: (1) the height, number of stories, and size of buildings and other structures;
The code hands this to the legislative body of each county and municipal corporation, which is not published in the code itself.
Also on how height is measured in Bowie
- no rule, documents checkedNeither the six foot threshold nor the four foot Huntington limit says what it is measured from. No grade is named, no curb, no finished ground level, and nothing says whose side of a boundary a height is read from. A berm is not addressed. A fence standing on a retaining wall is addressed only to say that nothing in the section prevents the installation of a required guard or fence on a retaining wall, which permits it without measuring it, and the six foot rule does separately count a retaining wall as a fence for the purpose of leaving a required yard. Where the section does get precise is about time and materials rather than height: it defines repairing a nonconforming fence as ordinary repairs including replacement in kind of post caps, gates, gate hardware and vertical pickets, and excludes replacing the posts or the horizontal members, changing the character, or altering dimensions, design or materials. Section 26-2Bowie · Zoning code
Fence rules for corner lots in Bowie
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Bowie answers this, but the answer changes depending on where the side street building restriction line sits and what is across the street.
The purpose clause names the corner problem directly, saying the fence restrictions exist among other things to prevent the obstruction or reduction, by man-made structures, of visibility at corners and intersections for drivers and pedestrians. What follows is not a triangle but a set of rules keyed to where the building restriction line falls. Where a corner lot has a twenty five foot side street building restriction line, fences are prohibited in the side yard and a rear yard fence has to stay fifteen feet off the side street property line. Where the line is fifteen feet, or where the abutting land is dedicated open space or under a conservation easement and publicly or association owned, fences are prohibited between the building restriction line and the side street but the whole rear yard is open. Both rules have the same escape: a fence may go anywhere in the side street yard where that lot line continues the rear yard lot line of the adjoining lot.
Except as hereinafter provided, on corner lots where the building restriction line of the side street yard is located 25 feet from the property line, fences are prohibited in the side yard. Fences in the rear yard on these corner lots shall be at least 15 feet from the property line at any given point along or abutting the side street
The answer turns on where the side street building restriction line sits and what is across the street.
- a twenty five foot building restriction line
- No side yard fence, and fifteen feet off in the rear. 15 ft
- a fifteen foot line, or open space opposite
- Nothing between the line and the street.
- a side street line continuing a neighbor rear line
- A fence may go anywhere in that yard.
- a through corner lot
- One yard is the apparent front, the other two are side street yards.
Also on corner visibility in Bowie
- set in state lawMaryland keeps this short. State law says a person may not put anything blocking a state highway, or any improvement, on that highway unless the State Highway Administration has issued a permit for it. A fence set onto the state road strip needs that permit. There is no sight distance figure and no corner triangle in the subtitle, and the height and placement of a fence on a private lot is left to county and town zoning, so the triangle in Maryland is written locally. Md. Code, Transp. 8-646Maryland · Traffic code
Retaining wall rules in Bowie
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Bowie does not set this. It leaves it to the 2021 International Residential Code and the 2021 International Building Code.
Maryland adopts three model codes as its own, among them the 2021 International Residential Code for one and two family homes. Maryland then lists its changes to those codes, and that list never mentions a wall that holds back dirt. So the rule for such a wall comes from the model code, and Maryland prints no number of its own. The same chapter puts running and enforcing the standards on each local office.
This one is Maryland law, not Bowie law. All Maryland findings
A. In this chapter, the following documents are incorporated by reference: (1) 2021 International Building Code (International Code Council); (2) 2021 International Residential Code for One- and Two-Family Dwellings (International Code Council); and (3) 2021 International Energy Conservation Code (International Code Council).
The code hands this to the 2021 International Residential Code and the 2021 International Building Code, which is not published in the code itself.
Fence materials allowed in Bowie
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Bowie answers this, but the answer changes depending on whether the thing is a fence at all, and whether it stands in Huntington.
The city does its material work in the definition rather than in the rules. A fence means any structure, barrier or partition that encloses land, divides it, separates two contiguous estates or obstructs pedestrian crossing, built of any type of fencing material, chain, railing, arbor, trellis, blocks, bricks, stones, wood, iron wire, plastics, concrete or any other building material. A purely decorative structure is not a fence provided it stays under four feet, and provided a residential lot carries no more than four eight-foot sections of it, with no more than two connected or standing within twelve feet of each other, and provided the whole length is landscaped with bushes, shrubs, plants or flowers. Where a front or side street fence is allowed at all, in the Huntington section, it has to be wood, cast iron or wire, or something consistent with the city historic guidelines, and stone and brick features may be worked in only as far as those guidelines permit.
provided, however, that a structure which is solely for decorative purposes shall not constitute a fence, as long as such structure does not exceed four feet in height, and provided that such structures on any residential lot do not, in total, consist of more than four eight-foot sections, with no more than two such sections being connected or located within 12 feet of each other.
The answer turns on whether the thing is a fence at all, and whether it stands in Huntington.
- almost any building material
- It counts as a fence.
- a small decorative structure
- Not a fence, within four limits.
- a Huntington street fence
- Wood, cast iron or wire.
- barbed, razor or electric wire
- Not named in the section either way.
Also on materials in Bowie
- set in state lawMaryland says what a battery charged fence security system has to look like, which is an electric fence wired into a burglar alarm. It runs on a battery of no more than 12 volts and stands behind a fence or wall at least 5 feet tall that carries no charge. It sits on land not zoned for homes only, stops at 10 feet, and carries warning signs every 30 feet. A local government may inspect one and fine an owner up to $500 for a fence that does not match, but it may not ban one or add its own rules for putting one up. Deer fencing and livestock fencing are left out of the section. Md. Code, Bus. Reg. 19-902Maryland · Statute
Livestock and boundary fence law in Bowie
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Bowie does not set this. It leaves it to each county.
Maryland writes no statewide rule for how a farm fence is built. It gives each county three powers instead. A county can set the rules for building and keeping up a fence. It can set a way for neighbors to enforce their fence rights against each other. And it can let an owner who repairs a shared fence put a lien on the property for the cost. So the height, the wire count and the post spacing come from county law.
This one is Maryland law, not Bowie law. All Maryland findings
A county may: (1) regulate the construction and maintenance of fences; (2) provide for a procedure to enforce the rights of parties with reference to a fence; and (3) provide for a lien for repairs to a fence made by an owner who is not in default.
The code hands this to each county, which is not published in the code itself.
Documents behind this page
9 documents, of which 2 were published by Bowie itself. Each was read on the date shown.
- Maryland General AssemblyAnnotated Code of Maryland, Local Government Article, Section 10-318
- City of BowieCode of the City of Bowie, Chapter 26, Zoning, Article I, In General, Section 26-2, Fences
- Maryland General AssemblyAnnotated Code of Maryland, Land Use Article, Section 25-303
- Maryland Department of Labor, Division of Labor and IndustryCode of Maryland Regulations, Title 09, Subtitle 12, Chapter 51, Maryland Building Performance Standards, Regulation .04 Incorporation by Reference
- Maryland Department of Labor, Division of Labor and IndustryCode of Maryland Regulations, Title 09, Subtitle 12, Chapter 56, Maryland Swimming Pool and Spa Standards, Regulation .03 Incorporation by Reference
- Maryland General AssemblyAnnotated Code of Maryland, Land Use Article, Section 4-102
- City of BowieCode of the City of Bowie, Chapter 26, Zoning, Article I, In General, Section 26-1, Definitions
- Maryland General AssemblyAnnotated Code of Maryland, Transportation Article, Title 8, Subtitle 6, Section 8-646, Permit required for work on highway
- Maryland General AssemblyAnnotated Code of Maryland, Business Regulation Article, Section 19-902
What this page does not cover
A city ordinance is not the only rule that reaches a fence. The zoning district a parcel sits in can change the height allowed on it, and so can an overlay district, a recorded easement, a fire hazard severity zone or a coastal zone. A homeowner association can be stricter than the city and nothing in the municipal code will say so. None of those appear here.
The rules above are the ones Bowie publishes, plus the Maryland rules that apply where the city sets none. Fence laws in Maryland has the state layer in full.
This is general information drawn from published government documents. It is not legal advice, ordinances are amended, and the date beside each finding is the date the document was read. How findings are made · What the terms mean