Lakewood, WA Home Business: Customer Traffic Restrictions (2026)

110(B)(7)(d) is the specific traffic-control rule for home businesses that see customers in person. It permits on-site client contact only under three conditions read together: all client-related activity has to occur inside the primary residential structure or an accessory building rather than outdoors or in the driveway; the home occupation cannot generate more than two vehicle trips per hour arriving at the licensed residence, a hard numeric ceiling that applies regardless of how the trips are spread across the day; and the business cannot create a public nuisance for neighbors, which ties this subsection to Lakewood's general nuisance and noise standards elsewhere in the code.

110(B)(7), including the requirement that the business stay subordinate to the home's residential character and be staffed by resident family members plus at most one outside employee. Because the traffic limit is measured in vehicle trips per hour rather than total daily visits, a business that clusters several appointments back-to-back within one hour can violate the standard even if its total daily client count is otherwise modest. The rule effectively rules out any home-based business model built around continuous walk-in or drive-in traffic, such as a retail storefront or a high-volume consultation practice, while still accommodating occasional client meetings.