Quote:
Originally Posted by Derek UK
A friend of mine in Zaandam had to get some substantial piling done before he could get permission for his garage. OK it was a two story industrial unit but it shows how unstable a lot of the reclaimed land is. His house, garage and a large area around it now flattened after a buy out by a housing consortium. Financially that didn't do him any harm and he's now rebuilt his garage with lift etc into a rather nice bungalow not too many miles away.  |
The ground here is fenland but I'm not having to go down the piling route (unless I have to). I don't think the main house was built on piles...
...anyway all of the building work I'll be doing will be within the generous requirements for permission free building. For the space I have I can build on an area up to 250 square meters including existing buildings. The maximum height of a pitched roof structure is 5 meters. There are some other requirements about the positioning but all in all it is quite liberal in what you can do here.
Proper planning permission can be horrifically expensive in some regions - there are some scary stories of people asking for a dropped curb for a driveway - having to pay about 2K only to have the request denied!
Consequently I'm very keen to make sure I remain within the prescribed limits of permission free building (even been to see the local council to have my plans checked).