Lebanese Construction Law N. 646 – English 2026

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The Lebanese Building Law, now in English

Decree No. 15874/2005 — the Implementing Decree of Building Law No. 646/2004 — translated in full, with all 116 original diagrams.

Anyone who designs, builds or buys in Lebanon works under this decree. It is the text that turns the Building Law into practical rules: how far a building must sit back from the road, how high it can rise on a sloping plot, what counts inside the exploitation factors, how many parking spaces a project owes and what a legal ramp looks like. Until now it has only existed in Arabic, which leaves foreign consultants, investors and clients reading it second-hand.

We had it translated into English, article by article, and kept every diagram from the original in place.

What’s inside

• Articles 1 to 6 — works exempt from a permit, boundary fences, land levelling and retaining walls, demolition, permit procedure and renewal, the occupancy permit
• Articles 7 to 9 — the envelope on roads, squares and courtyards, permitted projections, and the rules for securing a view range
• Articles 10 to 12 — public safety and airport easements, high-rise buildings above 50 m, building height and floor counts, and the surface and total exploitation factors
• Articles 13 to 16 — what may be built inside a setback, large complexes, the garage in full detail, and additional and public garages
• Articles 17 to 20 — minimum free heights, duplexes, chalets and cabins, and the repealing provisions

How to use it

The 116 figures are reproduced exactly as they appear in the Arabic decree, with their Arabic labels, each placed next to the article it illustrates and captioned in English. Every article is bookmarked, so you can jump straight to the envelope or the parking rules. A short glossary on the cover page maps the key terms — setback, envelope, view range, exploitation factor — to their Arabic originals, so you can check any clause against the source.

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Click to view the full English translation below.