New Rochelle, NY Fence Regulations: Material Restrictions (2026)

Zoning Code § 331-16H draws a flat line against dangerous fencing materials: electrically charged fences, barbed-wire fences and other fences built of sharp materials are not permitted in any residentially zoned district. The ban does not stop at the zoning line, either. In a district other than residential, the same materials are still barred if the installation would be visible from the street or from any residential zone, so a warehouse or utility yard bordering a residential neighborhood cannot ring its property in barbed wire facing that street or that neighborhood.

Read together with the rest of § 331-16, which caps ordinary fences at four feet in a front yard and six feet in a side or rear yard, the material ban means a homeowner cannot get around the height limits by topping a code-compliant fence with barbed wire or running current through it. The only fencing exception that raises height in New Rochelle, the six-foot solid or eight-foot 3/4-open fence allowed under § 331-16D around a public utility or government use, still has to be built of ordinary materials rather than barbed wire or electrified mesh, since Subsection H's material ban is not tied to the height subsections and applies across the chapter.

The rule traces to the 2004 overhaul of § 331-16 under Ordinance No. 90-2004, which rewrote the entire fences-and-walls section including the barbed-wire and electric-fence prohibition.