So we went through the first round of landscaping approval with the HOA. Because of the cost of implementing the entire landscaping project, we thought it would be prudent to stage the installation over the course of 5-7 years. Of course this meant trying to prioritize which elements would be needed to satisfy driveway conditions and HOA deed restrictions. Although we submitted the entire first draft plan to the HOA, they requested that we resubmit every time we want to implement a new phase, so that means they'll be in our lives longer than we thought.
We decided that for occupancy, we would need any elements that support the driveway. This means the front retaining walls, the retaining wall near the street, and all associated tree removals. In our neighborhood, if a tree measure 6" or more 4' off the ground, you need HOA approval to remove it. We also decided that since the pool would need to be implemented before any of the areas around the gazebo and great room, we should move as quickly as our pocketbook allows. We could also use the excavated materials as fill dirt in the driveway area.
We met with Great Oaks and the HOA on August 13th to walk the property and examine the tress requested for removal. The HOA committee also requested that stakes be placed demarcating landscaping elements. They approved all the requested tree slated for removal and suggested a few more that we should remove. They approved the retaining walls and the installation of the pool. The pool was an interesting item. Because a corner of the pool is exposed 5' as the grade drops away, there was consideration if it violated a deed restriction. The deed restriction states that pools that are 1' above grade are not allowed. Now this is intended to prevent construction of above ground pools, and ours clearly isn't an above ground pool. I also suspect that this deed restriction was created before infinity edge pools were more popular since these would technically not be allowed. The work around is that the exterior of the pool will be covered with a stone similar to that on the house, so it will be considered a retaining wall, which is allowed. Semantics.
Great Oaks submitted the plans to the city for engineering approval, but ran up against a snag. The city requires a 25' setback from wetland borders so a revision was required to adhere to the setback.
As you can see in the front yard revisions above, the bold dashed line is the designated wetland and the other dashed line is the setback, which comes very,very close to the house. I can't tell if we were lucky with that or the surveyor gave pity on us since we were already building. The areas in blue were the original plans. The large graceful retaining wall needs to be reduced to a tall concrete wall, which will be covered with the river stone that's used on the basement level of the house. I'm not sure what the final cost differential will be since, although we aren't using loads of stone and numerous plantings, we'll need an engineer to design the wall and materials to cover it. It might be pretty close in cost.
Another consequence of the change is that the driveway turnaround area is drastically reduced. We had some concerns about properly navigating our vehicles out of the driveway so Geoff and his team provided this revision.
This design extends the concrete retaining wall to provide more space for turning a vehicle around in. They actually laid this design out in their parking lot and navigated it with a large pickup truck and a Prius, just to verify it was possible to turn around. There will need to be a safety rail on the wall and an asphalt curb on the edge of the driveway to prevent cars from driving over, but these are the compromises that come with construction. Bushes can be planted in the space between the driveway and fence to help obscure it and no fence is needed on the remaining rock retaining wall, providing a nice little overlook in front of the house.
The backyard required some revisions as well, shifting the pool location to the south and moving where the proposed pool fence would be. Since the HOA was concerned about the area the pool fence would enclose (more on this on-going epic battle later) hopefully this reduced area design will satisfy their requests.
Current status of the landscaping design is that the revisions are being submitted to the city for approval. This brought with it added costs for concrete wall engineering and survey staking. Of course, these revision will need to be resubmitted to the HOA for approval.
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