The short answer: a dead end may run 275 m at the very most, and a plot with no road is still entitled to one. Regulation 3.3 governs the geometry of a layout, and most of it is invisible on a brochure while being decisive on a site plan.
Key takeaways
- A layout proposal is obligatory whenever more than one building is proposed, or land is subdivided or amalgamated, or a group housing or cluster scheme is planned.
- A cul-de-sac may run 150 m normally and 275 m at most, only in a residential area and on a straight road, with its dead end higher than its start and a turning space of at least 81 sq m with no dimension below 9.0 m.
- A right angled junction is rounded off with a tangent of half the road width and buildings set back from the rounded line, and at acute and obtuse junctions the rounding radius is at least 6 m.
- Plots along highways take access from service roads, and only highway amenities such as a fuel station or hotel take direct access.
- A land-locked plot gets access through a neighbour at its own cost, and up to 100 m it counts as fronting the main road.
When a layout is required at all
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.1, Obligation to Prepare Layout lists three triggers and one procedural rule, and the first trigger is broader than people expect.
| Clause | What it means |
|---|---|
| More than one building proposed on any land, excluding accessory buildings in a residential case | The owner must submit a layout or subdivision proposal for the entire contiguous holding, not just the part being built on |
| Development or redevelopment involving division, subdivision or amalgamation for various land uses | Layout required |
| A group housing scheme, or campus or cluster planning of any use | Layout required |
| The procedural rule | Where necessary, the two stage approval process under Regulation 2.6.1 applies |
The words to notice in the first row are entire contiguous holding. A second building on part of a larger holding pulls the whole holding into a layout proposal, which is why an owner developing incrementally still ends up planning the balance land.
Roads inside the layout
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.2, Roads / Streets in Land Sub-division or Layout ties width to length, which is the opposite of the intuition that a longer road can be narrower because it serves fewer plots per metre.
Banded by length of the internal road
- Up to 150 m9.00 m
- Above 150 m and up to 300 m12.00 m
- Above 300 m15.00 m
Source: Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.2, Table 3A, UDCPR as updated 30 January 2025
Where plots of 100 sq m or less are proposed for Economically Weaker Sections, the table relaxes: a 4.5 m road up to 60.0 m of length, and 6.0 m for longer runs.
Once built, those roads may not stay private. Regulation 3.3.11 provides that whenever the Authority calls for it, internal layout roads are handed over to the Planning Authority by deed after development, with no compensation paid.
The cul-de-sac, and its four conditions
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.10, Cul-de-sacs is short and every clause in it constrains a real design decision.
Cul-de-sacs giving access to plots may extend up to 150 m normally and 275 m maximum, with an additional turning space at 150 m. Four conditions:
- Only in a residential area.
- Only on straight roads.
- The cul-de-sac end must be higher in level than the level of the starting point.
- The turning space must be not less than 81 sq m, with no dimension below 9.0 m.
Operationally, a cul-de-sac works like a loading bay with one gate. Every vehicle that goes in has to turn and come out the same way, so the code limits how far in it reaches, demands room to turn at the end, and wants the end visible from the entrance and dry.
The level condition is the one that reads oddly until you think about what a dead end does with water.
A cul-de-sac has no downstream outlet. If the closed end is the low point, every millimetre of rain on that road collects at the point furthest from the drainage network, in front of the plots at the end. Requiring the end to sit higher than the entrance makes the road drain outward by gravity to the network it came from.
The "straight roads only" condition works the same way, on sight lines rather than water. A curved dead end hides the turning space from a vehicle entering it, including a fire tender, which cannot reverse 275 m.
The 81 sq m turning space with no dimension below 9.0 m is a 9 by 9 square at minimum, and that is a turning circle specification wearing an area requirement's clothes.
Junctions
Two regulations govern what happens where roads meet, and both work by cutting the corner rather than by setting a distance.
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.12, Intersection of Roads# applies to roads meeting at right angles: the rounding off at the intersection is done with the tangent length from the point of intersection to the curve being half the road width across the direction of the tangent. And crucially, the building shall also set back at the required marginal distance from this rounding off, not from the original corner.
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.13, Acute Angled Junctions covers junctions at less than 60 degrees: rounding off, cut off or similar treatment with tangent lengths from the intersection point. At an obtuse angle junction, the tangent length equals half the width of the road from which the vehicle enters. For both types, the radius for the junction rounding shall not be less than 6 m.
The corner plot loses twice, therefore: once to the rounding itself and again to the marginal distance measured from the new rounded line. That is on top of the 0.75 m compound wall limit across the road fanning, which applies to the same corner for the same sight line reason.
Highways, and the service road rule
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.8, Access from the Highways / Classified Roads* begins with a plain instruction: plots and buildings along highways and classified roads shall generally derive access from service roads. Direct access from the highway is for highway amenities such as a petrol pump, fuel station or hotel, and even then subject to the National Highways Act, 1956 and the State Highways Act, 1955.
The widths to be assumed when granting permission, unless the Development Plan, Regional Plan, planning proposal or TP scheme says otherwise:
| Category of road | Right of way | Service road |
|---|---|---|
| National Highway | 60.0 m | Inclusive of 12.0 m service roads on both sides |
| State Highway | 45.0 m | Inclusive of 9.0 m service roads on both sides |
| Major District Road | 24.0 m | None required |
| Other District Road | 18.0 m | None required |
| Village Road | 15.0 m | None required |
Three notes govern the table. Where an existing road is wider than the table says, the greater width prevails. Where service roads were provided beyond the right of way under an earlier permission, they may be continued into adjoining land. And the widths may vary per guidelines or circulars from the respective department. The provision applies to Area Development Authorities, Metropolitan Region Development Authorities, Special Planning Authorities, New Town Development Authorities and Regional Plan areas.
The National Highway row is worth reading carefully, because the 60.0 m figure includes the service roads.
A plot shown as fronting a National Highway is not fronting 60 m of carriageway. It fronts a 12 m service road, which is what its access must come from, sitting inside a 60 m right of way. The road width that decides FSI is a different question again, and answering it with "60 m highway" when the plot actually takes access from a 12 m service road is a mistake that changes a project's potential.
The land-locked plot
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.14, Land-locked Plot is one of the few provisions in the code that creates an entitlement against a neighbour.
Where a plot is surrounded on all sides by other plots or reservations and has no access to any street or road, the Authority may require access through an adjoining plot or plots, as far as possible nearest to the street, at the cost of the owner of the land-locked plot, and on such conditions as the Authority specifies.
Where the plot is land-locked by a reservation, access may be made available by adjusting the reservation within the owner's land without reduction in its area. The reservation moves rather than shrinks.
And the last sentence is the commercially significant one: a land-locked plot, up to 100 m, shall be considered as fronting on the main road from which access of minimum 9.0 m width is made available.
That is not just a right of way. It is a right to be treated, for regulatory purposes, as if the plot fronted the main road, within 100 m. Given how much in this code turns on the width of the road a plot fronts, that sentence can be worth more than the access itself.
Names and numbers in this story are illustrative. Anita Rao was offered a parcel on the edge of Pune behind a row of road-facing plots, at a discount because it had no road of its own. The seller's agent described it as land-locked, as though that settled its value.
Regulation 3.3.14 reopened the question. Access could be required through the adjoining land at her firm's cost, and once a 9.0 m access was made available, the parcel would count as fronting the main road for up to 100 m. The discount was pricing a problem the code had already provided for, and what was left to price was the access itself.
Chapter 3, Regulation 3.3.15, Approach by Underpass or Over Bride for Adjoining Properties covers the related case of adjoining properties separated by a road, river or nallah: the Authority may allow the owner to build an underpass, over bridge or foot over bridge of the required size at his cost to ease movement across the properties.
What the register shows
MahaRERA does not publish a layout drawing, a road width or an access arrangement. There is no field for any of it.
What the register does publish, free, is the filed land area and the buildings with their proposed and sanctioned floors, and those two together are a coarse but real check: a layout of a given area supports a certain number of buildings only if the road area, the recreational open space and the marginal distances all fit inside it. The 10 percent recreational open space is the other deduction from the same land.
How often that check applies is itself on the register. Of the 55,958 published MahaRERA projects that file a count of approved buildings, as updated on 29 September 2026, 13,398 (23.9%) file two or more, which is what the first layout trigger in Regulation 3.3.1 turns on, and 2,785 (5.0%) file five or more.
Access, junction geometry and the cul-de-sac conditions are sanctioned plan questions, and the plan is a public document on the Authority's website for the life of the project, which is where they are actually answerable.
Related rule cards
- Layout roads and minimum plot sizes
- Whether the road width makes your plot R1 or R2
- How to read a sanctioned plan without being an architect
- Recreational open space: the 10 percent
Where the filings come in
Layout approval sits with the Planning Authority.
The register carries what was registered to sell, free at reragenie.com: the filed land area, the buildings and their floors, the sanctioned and sold units where filed, the promoter's extension history with reasons, the certifying professionals, and any complaints or litigation with case numbers.
ReraGenie's project analysis, Rs 2,999 for one project, reads the full filing and the documents behind it, maps every registration within 5 km from the filed coordinates, and sets percent sold against age across the active projects in that market that file sales. The area market report reads every registration in one pincode together, for a flat Rs 2,999. To hear when a new project is registered in the areas you are watching, sign up on ReraGenie: the alerts are free during the pilot beta.
Source: Unified Development Control and Promotion Regulations for Maharashtra, UDCPR as updated 30 January 2025. Sanctioned under the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act, 1966.
Evaluating a micro-market or a land parcel?
The ReraGenie project analysis reads the filings around your parcel: supply, absorption and promoter records. Rs 2,999 per project; the area market report is a flat Rs 2,999 per pincode.
See the project analysis