El Paso, TX Building Setbacks & Zoning: Lot Coverage Limits (2026)

Section 20.12.020 of the El Paso City Code adopts the Table of Density and Dimensional Standards, Appendix B to Title 20, and incorporates it by reference. Row P.2 of that table is the lot coverage rule for attached single-family housing in the A-O Apartment/Office District (the table prints the district as A-0). The row covers atrium houses, patio houses and townhomes, and its Other Standards cell reads: "Minimum lot area of 750 sf per dwelling unit; lot coverage not to exceed 50%".

Section 20.02.154 defines building coverage (lot coverage) as the percentage of a lot that can be covered by a structure or structures or any part thereof, excluding roof overhang. Every structure counts toward the 50%, not only the dwelling, while the overhang of a roof does not. On a lot at the 6,000 square foot minimum, 50% works out to 3,000 square feet of coverage.

The rest of row P.2 sets the envelope around that cap. The minimum lot is 6,000 square feet, with a minimum average lot width of 50 feet and a minimum lot depth of 100 feet. The yards are 0 feet in front, 25 feet in the rear, 5 feet on the side and 10 feet on a side street, and the cumulative yard columns and the small lot column print N/A. Maximum height is 45 feet. The district has no minimum district area.

The neighboring A-O rows handle coverage differently. Single-family detached dwellings in row P and duplexes in row P.1 print "None" in the Other Standards cell, so no coverage percentage appears there, and row P.3 for other permitted uses sends the reader to Chapter 20.10. Row P.2 is the only A-O row that prints a 50% cap.

The housing types are defined in Chapter 20.02. An atrium house is an attached single-family dwelling shaped to surround or partly surround a private covered space called an atrium. A patio house is an attached or semidetached single-family dwelling with an enclosed private court or patio. A townhouse is one of a group or series of three or more attached single-family dwellings separated by common property lines. Section 20.12.020 also provides that required yards, height limits and open spaces cannot be encroached upon or counted for any other building, that no lot area or lot dimension can be reduced below the table, and that where Chapter 20.10 adds standards, the more restrictive standard applies.