The Somersoft Development

[MichaelW]

Can you send me a scale drawing of the site? I'll have a play around with it if you like. As someone mentioned earlier, designing for the shape of the block will make the most out of it. This will mean that the units aren't all the same sizes but it will add interest and Council will love you.

Sharon,

Many thanks. Just open the attachment and right click on the picture and choose "save image as" to save it somewhere. I just grabbed this shot off the Pittwater local council mapping website. Its oriented to the North. 1636 in the middle of the block is just our street number, its 1636 Pittwater Rd, Mona Vale. The tree in the North-most corner is under a tree preservation order.

If any other budding architects want to have a go then feel free to scribble away!

Cheers,
Michael.

PS My wife said we wouldn't need to contribute section 94 fees due to the size of the development so I've left it at that. I'll need to confirm this down the track, but Kay knows that stuff pretty well as she used to work for the land and environment court of NSW and topped both local government law and environmental law at Uni.

 

[MrB]

Michael
The shape of your land makes any design a real interesting exercise to maximise the yield, so when it comes to getting professional help make sure you get plenty of options, which may mean that you should not just go with the cheapest designer. They will need to spend plenty of time on this design.

I admire that you are trying out a few ideas of your own, but just a bit of input.

The shape of the block may allow some flexibilty in relation to Council DCP. DCP setbacks for side and rear boundaries is 3 metres for one storey, and more for two storey MUH. The setbacks off street boundaries would be assessed in relation to adjoining sites.

Basement parking is really the only way to achieve the parking you need for 3 dwellings. Council will never allow a line of garages on the street alignment. However you need to consider the length of the entry ramp. If the parking basement is to be underground, and you are building this basement up to the street boundary, then the floor slab will be say 2.5 metres below the ground level at the street alignment.
However this will require the ramp to be about 15 metres long from the street alignment to satisfy maximum grades.

Otherwise you will need to bring the parking basement in further from the street, which would allow the floor slab to be higher, but keep in mind your DCP height limit above existing ground level when you put two floors above it.

Check with Council about Sec 94 contributions. These would normally be imposed on each additional dwelling for MUH.

Wishing you a successful development.

 

[TommyR]

Hi MichaelW,

I was looking at your plan for putting the DLUGs under the living areas and I wondered if you have over estimated the size - Do you need to allow 60m2 for each dwelling? Most DLUGs are around 6x6=36m2. It would save a lot on excavating costs etc - you don't really need to excavate to the whole footprint of the main building.

One other consideration we had to make when we were in the planning stages of a 4x2 developement we are currently undertaking was the open space requirement for each unit - we needed 25m2 of open space, for each bedroom, with no dimension less than 4m, this caused a lot of juggling to make them fit and was the main factor we opted for 2br instead of 3br

Just a couple of thoughts

Tom

 

[thebuildingsurv]

With a common basement carpark this will change the dwellings Building Code Classification from Class 1a to class 2. This will involve additional costs for construction due to fire ratings and you may also need to engage a fire engineer if any of the dwellings are close to the boundary. We have recently completed the town planning process in vic for a site shaped simalar to your block that was 1200 and due to setbacks etc ended up with only 3 dwellings (we kept an existing dwelling however) it may be better to put 2 quality homes instead. Talk to a draftie get some concept plans and talk to your building surveyor and town planner. A basement garage for each dwelling with say a cantilevered deck for private open space maybe the way to go. You might consider one double crossover on one road and a single on the other. Counsel may consent to that. Talk to the town planner and wear them down eventually they say yes to get rid of you.

 

[Jindaro]

This is a very preliminary sketch. As I don’t know the setbacks, I have assumed 3m for a corner block and 5.5m to a garage. This allows an extra car to stack park in front of the garage.

I didn’t realise your site was so small. I’m used to having about 300sqm per dwelling play with – heheh.

No visitor parking has been allowed for due to space constraints, but you might be able to get around this by employing a good townplanner to write your S.E.E. (Statement of Environmental Effects) and they could point out that you have allowed for extra parking in front of the garages. Alternatively, given more time, I could find extra space for the visitor but this is where you get into the nitty, gritty of the design. I was thinking about placing it between the side boundary and U1 garage.

Good luck.

ps - this is the first time I've attached a sketch on this forum - hope it comes through.

 

[MichaelW]

this is the first time I've attached a sketch on this forum - hope it comes through.

Sharon,

Thank You so much! Unfortunately that sketch came through as a very small image and when I scale it up I can't really make out any of the detail. Its an Adobe Photoshop file and I downloaded a viewer especially to view it. If there was any way you could post it as a larger image I'd be indebted to you.

Thanks again,
Michael.

 

[doreilly]

Sharon,

Could you post that attachment in something other than Photoshop ?

I don't think most readers will have it.

Thanks.

 

[-T-]

attached as a gif... but as MW said, it's too small.

 

[Jindaro]

Sharon,

Could you post that attachment in something other than Photoshop ?

I don't think most readers will have it.

Thanks.

I have it in a pdf 1200kb file, but it seems that I can only upload 100kb files. How can I get around this?

 

[geoffw]

I have it in a pdf 1200kb file, but it seems that I can only upload 100kb files. How can I get around this?

Does your software have a facility to export it into jpg (or even gif) format? You have options on size and resolutions- and it can be viewed by most people.

 

[MichaelW]

I have it in a pdf 1200kb file, but it seems that I can only upload 100kb files. How can I get around this?

Sharon,

If that's all a bit tricky just email it to me and I'll save it in a jpg format at appropriate resolution then post it for everyone to see...


Michael.

 

[Ruby]

Sharon,

If that's all a bit tricky just email it to me and I'll save it in a jpg format at appropriate resolution then post it for everyone to see...


Michael.

Or if you'd sooner, I'm happy to upload the pdf to a website so it can be downloaded from there.

Ruby

 

[ok180]

something else, as minor as it may seem.... If you make the parking all bunched together underground they're technically no longer townhouses.. they're townhouse style units

 

[Fish]

Thanks Michael,
I've been looking to follow a development project from go to whoa...so i'll follow yours with interest. The more detail, the merrier.
Cheers
Fish

 

[Jindaro]

Michael

Have sent you a couple of emails re the sketch I tried to attach, but haven't heard back yet. Maybe my mail is being blocked... email me and I will attach sketch for you to see if you can post it for me. Thanks.

 

[MichaelW]

Michael

Have sent you a couple of emails re the sketch I tried to attach, but haven't heard back yet. Maybe my mail is being blocked... email me and I will attach sketch for you to see if you can post it for me. Thanks.

Sharon,

I've emailed you from my work address which should allow the sketch through. I would have thought my hotmail address would have worked as well, but I guess not...

Thanks,
Michael

 

[see_change]

Michael

One thing to be aware of when working out site coverage / Hard / soft areas etc , is that using pavers with gaps in between ( which allow water to drain to ground below ) can be treated as soft area , as can gravel / pebble surfaces. With our previous development we had part of a court yard with gapped pavers ( with mondo grass between ) / parking bay with pebble surface ( compacted decorative stone is alternative and looks good ) and a pathway with seperated paver filled with pebbles all counted as soft areas allowing to increase the site coverage. You'd need to check with council what they'd allow.

With what I've read so far , I'd be very seriously looking at the option of going with 2 , larger villa's ( ? four bedooms , 2 baths ) and with plenty of garage / storage space . Sounds as though it will be a much cheaper option , and might be offering something that isn't already there as potential competition. I'd be talking to local agents about what they see as being more rentable, if there are already similar dwelling to what you are proposing in the street. IU'd be very concerned about the potential for cost blow outs if you're going the way of excavating for garages down below . Do you know what the other blocks in your street had subsurface. Maybe check out who the builders were and see if there is rock down there .

If there are others for sale in the street , have a good look at the structural work in the carparks.

See Change

 

[MichaelW]

Sharon,

Thanks, got the email! Here it is attached as a JPG. I'm not that clever, I just use print screen then go into MS Paint and crop it to the bit I want and save as a JPG. It typically comes out at around 70kb.

I like this layout. It is not too disimilar to the very first sketch that I uploaded at the top of this thread. Again it suffers from the single garage per townhouse as mine did. I note that you've allowed the 5.5m setback from the street so that I can get a car stacked in front and claim the dual car parking per site. That's great as it should overcome the council restriction on minimum carparking per site. Trying to get a DLUG for each house onto that block is a bit of a struggle unless I incorporate them into their respective buildings. The fall on the block is sufficient that I might be able to do this and not lose any internal floor space. I'm thinking a sort of split level design with two levels at the front and three at the rear of which one is the DLUG.

Anyway, thanks so much for your ideas. I'll study it in detail now that I can see it readily, but thought I'd post it up here straight away so others can do likewise. That is some fantastic work and you've really helped me clarify some of my ideas. I definately want to try and get three on here as I'm sure the margin would be better if I do so. See Change, I still fully agree that a nice big duplex each with DLUGs is the fall back. However demand for smaller properties seems to be the norm in this area and they demand a better price relative their cost than the bigger places do. I might still run the detailed numbers on both options before I make a definative call either way.

Cheers,
Michael.

 

[michaelg]

Hi,

Two thoughts...

1) Get a copy of last Sunday's Sydney Morning Herald - in the property section there is a great little terrace that has a stack of luxury ideas (underground theatre, lap pool, sunken bedroom with water feature etc).

2) Another thought...I saw Fast & Furious Tokyo Drift a couple of weeks ago, I was thinking about the rotating car stacker. My thought was if you have a double garage space, so that it was 2 cars high but have 1 level below ground and had a 4 car rotating system, then in effect you could have a 4 car garage - where every car could be easily driven in and out.

We'll it would be something different - the only thing I could think of is maintenace of the system, but if you're selling them - the question would be how would be responsible for servicing each unit?

Imagine;

- his car
- her car
- their speedboat
- visitor

That's right, maybe that would also account for visitor car spots as well?

Just a thought
Michael G

 

[Peter 14.7]

Hi All

Great to see such a response to Michael’s thread.

Been busy “tree-changing” but here is my thoughts having seen the site.

1. Design of driveways is dependant on Access. Knowing the corner it is unlikely you will get more than one access point and probably on the high road as this can to exited when the lights are on red. Need to talk to Council or RTA re Road Access. It will dominate design.

2. If you are building for long term set and forget rental make them Rental Friendly.

I have said to Michael work out the target market and target them. We will be doing the same in Woodend with our development.

NB I note following are fine details but allow me to rant to demonstrate my point.

Mrs 14.7 and I move in to our brand new 3-bed villa tomorrow as we begin renovate of heritage cottage. Having not rented for 10 years our observations so far!

NOT SO HAPPY JOHN

A. Who the Hell puts Cream Carpet into a rental property! It is new and spotless and even with house socks for guests (yes MW visitors will be made to wear house socks) our baby will eventually have a “chunky burp” and game over baby! Even the dining room is fricking carpet! Lesson: think about wear and tear and what looks best long term. Not fashion.

B. Only one telephone point! Hello? How do I get DSL in the bedroom/office? Lesson: Telephone Points are Cheap, put em everywhere.

C. No Internal access from the garage to the kitchen despite being only a wall apart, Minor Point? Not when it is raining and 4 degrees outside and you have a load of food to get in and as previously mentioned chubby bubby is screaming for dinner! Lesson: Smart Design is not always costly.

D. Access for Fridge very tight. Doorways are white and cream and unmarked. Like trying to steer the Titanic. Lesson: Easier Access please will mean less damaged over the years of use.

VERY NICE, THANKYOU

A. Big Robes in Every Bedroom plus a large Pantry plus a large Linen and even a Broom Cupboard. Lesson: you cannot have too much storage.

B. Simple but effective: Separate Toilet to Bathroom. Lesson: Obvious.

C. Big Shower. Room for two on those cold nights. Or baby makes 3. Lesson: It costs only a little more but is more versatile for bathing kids and aged persons with chairs.

D. Good Security. Good Locks. Good Grills. Lesson: Mrs 14.7 feels Safe, so Mrs 14.7 happy therefore Peter 14.7 Happy.

E. Good Blinds and Curtain essential in a cold climate. Lesson: Added bonus.

FIND THE USP! the UNIQUE SELLING POINT

In each market, one or two things are what the market wants. I do not know the North Shore. Maybe

• Two car spaces?
• A large entertaining deck?
• Bathrooms for each bedroom?
• Maybe cable?

In Woodend, we looked at five to rent and discounted four because they had solid wood heaters where the winner had two reverse cycle air con. Simple, effective, no fuss.

What we were looking for in a rental.

Regards, Peter 14.7 (previously Peter 147)