Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Fern Bay Anyone 141Sep 05, 2012 9:42 pm That's ridiculous (and also not in the guidelines from when I bought the land, wonder which ones I'm obliged to go by?...). What are you doing with your fence? The 2002 Port Stephens Council Comprehensive Plan of Koala Management Appendix 4 'Proposed development criteria' states: The preferred option for minimising restrictions to safe koala movement is that there be no fencing (of a sort that would preclude koalas) associated with dog free developments within or adjacent to Preferred or Supplementary Koala Habitat, Habitat Buffers or Habitat Linking Areas. Suitable fencing for such areas could include: i) fences where the bottom of the fence is a minimum of 200 mm above ground level that would allow koalas to move underneath; ... However, where the keeping of domestic dogs has been permitted within or adjacent to Preferred or Supplementary Koala Habitat, Habitat Buffers or Habitat Linking Areas, fencing of a type that would be required to contain dogs (and which may also preclude koalas) should be restricted to the designated building envelope. Fences which are intended to preclude koalas should be located away from any trees which now or in the future could allow koalas to cross the fence. Wonder if that's what this silly thing is based on as the guidelines only say 'may include a 200mm gap'... Re: Fern Bay Anyone 142Sep 05, 2012 10:02 pm I have one side to the ground the remaining sides have no fence yet but both are vacant so no idea if i will get built to the ground or raise it the 200mm just in case Re: Fern Bay Anyone 143Sep 05, 2012 10:06 pm So I'm not crazy in wanting an 'all the way to the ground' fence? My hubby just thinks it sound so silly. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 144Sep 05, 2012 10:09 pm Nope plenty have it to the ground and id prefer it i just dont have any neighbours to check with Re: Fern Bay Anyone 145Sep 06, 2012 10:43 pm Well according to Cindy who contacted the project manager it IS a requirement. Load of nonsense. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 146Sep 07, 2012 7:08 am For what it is worth without the pine sleeper underneath and you have a dog they will be out of your yard quickly, sand takes very little time to shift. Everyone seems to have placed sleepers under their fences (as did we), I think this makes more sense if you are close to the bush, which your block is not. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 147Sep 07, 2012 9:28 am Well one side of us has the fence to the ground. Making the other two higher will probably look weird and we dont have any neighbors on the rear or to the side so yes its a bit of a tough one. Build to the ground and then whenever the lots sell behind, next to us they have to build to the ground as well or have one side and rear higher than the other side. Joys Re: Fern Bay Anyone 148Sep 07, 2012 10:24 am The guidelines would of been written when aspen were seeking initial approval through council for the estate. When applying some environmentalist would of said all the koalas would die from not beeing able to run around, so they said they can run through the estate under all the fences. Its hard to believe that council come up with a silly idea but they do : ) Cindy is not going to tell anyone to go against there development guidlines but if you do look around the estate not 1 other person has done the gap. Dont go looking to hard into the "actual" guidelines on some things or you may not like what you find. I am doing sleepers for the simple fact of increased height so I do not have to see my neighbours in there speedos sunbaking by their pool and vice versa. Rest assured I am doing everyone a favour : ) Re: Fern Bay Anyone 149Sep 11, 2012 10:45 am Behind us will be the new display lots. Where we are now we've just had a 2.4m soundblocking fence put in by council (with another 1m of clear perspex on top) as part of a new road development and I guess I'm just a bit hesitant about another taller fence as we're already feeling overshadowed here. (But thanks for protecting the good neighbours from your speedo sunbaking, Bab!) The project manager has confirmed that a solid fence to the ground with timber posts for 'climbing' ever 20m or so is also suitable. He obviously thought my enquires about the fences quite trivial and by the sounds of things there are many other 'breakers of the covenants' (ha!) up there so what are you lot all doing with your external colours, driveways and other selections, terrorising the good people of FB by not matching?! Re: Fern Bay Anyone 150Sep 12, 2012 10:32 am Miss Windsor He obviously thought my enquires about the fences quite trivial and by the sounds of things there are many other 'breakers of the covenants' (ha!) up there so what are you lot all doing with your external colours, driveways and other selections, terrorising the good people of FB by not matching?! All other covenants are not as silly as the fence, I'm still doing all the colour selections etc correctly to keep the feel of the place in unison still. Aspen have to sign off on designs anyway so whilst I dont agree with some things that have already been let through for some others I do think they are doing a good job with so many differences of opinions. And fence colours all seem to be woodland grey : ) Re: Fern Bay Anyone 151Nov 05, 2012 6:15 pm Hi people, We are building in fern bay and have a question about screens on the front door. Our builder has told us we need one yet we see so many houses in seaside village without. We'd rather not have one, just for street appeal, but if we have no choice then we have no choice. My question is do you have a screen door and if you don't, how did you get away with it when getting your occupancy cert.? Thanks Re: Fern Bay Anyone 152Nov 06, 2012 5:41 am There are mainly two reason for screen doors, 1) Screen out bugs (that is purely your call) 2) To meet Bushfire code (until recently the mainstream door manufacturers did not make many doors with glass that were capable of making the bushfire assessment, still not the whole range but at least some choices now). Bushfire assessment (BAL) is a site by site assessment, so not everyone in Fern Bay is affected, and then what you need on your door is influenced by materials choice and location. Hopefully this explains why some have, and some have not. This is not in the architectural requirements that is on Aspens web site, if you have not read it you should as there are other things covered in that to do with house design. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 153Nov 07, 2012 7:17 pm wildewombat There are mainly two reason for screen doors, 1) Screen out bugs (that is purely your call) 2) To meet Bushfire code (until recently the mainstream door manufacturers did not make many doors with glass that were capable of making the bushfire assessment, still not the whole range but at least some choices now). Bushfire assessment (BAL) is a site by site assessment, so not everyone in Fern Bay is affected, and then what you need on your door is influenced by materials choice and location. Hopefully this explains why some have, and some have not. This is not in the architectural requirements that is on Aspens web site, if you have not read it you should as there are other things covered in that to do with house design. Thanks, it explains a bit. I'm keen though to have a look at the door manufacturer's and see if there are any doors we can upgrade to that satisfy the requirements. We have BAL 12.5 so am hoping there would be something to cover us. Not sure how much the screen door would help is in a bush fire though... Re: Fern Bay Anyone 154Nov 23, 2012 9:22 am We've just got our first two tenders back and the one where a site inspection and soil test was done says that there is no gas connection available on our street and we'd need LPG. Have emailed off our neighbours but thought I'd ask on here too. I just assumed gas would be available... We're on Sygna St in Stage 4A if anyone is nearby. Also, what did others do re the 'Telstra Smart estate' thing? The other tender has included a package worth $2750 with a whole bunch of fancy looking stuff. All we do is minor internet surfing, watch Foxtel and DH would like to set his Xbox up on Xbox live... Re: Fern Bay Anyone 155Nov 23, 2012 9:34 am Gas is certainly in the estate, I would be very surprised if they left it out of your street. Your will need some form of wiring to connect to the Telstra service if you want non mobile phone, free to air TV, Foxtel, or fibre internet. There is NO copper wiring in your part of the estate, it all comes through the fibre. I highly recommend installing at least some cat 5/6 cabling into your house, it has uses over and above computer connections. You will need to have the wiring that is required for Telstra smart community, which includes the special power supply wiring, a power point(Inside) and at least two cat 5 cables wired to the fibre point. If you look on the smart community site they have some pretty good technical specs from very simple to high end. Add data cabling or coax at this point is the cheapest time to add it, they did 48 points in my house, plus some coax, for under a third of he price it would cost once the gyprock is on. Any question please ask Re: Fern Bay Anyone 156Nov 23, 2012 9:47 am I don't mind adding it in just annoying when it's in one quote and not in another! Also one quote says we need marine exposure grade stuff and another says we're far enough away not to bother. The cost of upgrading the roof if we go Colourbond instead of tiles is quite high so wondering if others have exposure grade stuff. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 158Nov 28, 2012 1:35 pm Quote for upgrade marine colourbond for ours was 12+k. Tiles it is! We did a few other exposure upgrades however, ss wall ties, window and doors frames, bricks and actual mortar adaptive. Also note that the "Telstra smart thing" also includes/provides your TV reception as there are no aerials. Re: Fern Bay Anyone 159Nov 28, 2012 6:27 pm Miss Windsor We've just got our first two tenders back and the one where a site inspection and soil test was done says that there is no gas connection available on our street and we'd need LPG. Have emailed off our neighbours but thought I'd ask on here too. I just assumed gas would be available... We're on Sygna St in Stage 4A if anyone is nearby. Also, what did others do re the 'Telstra Smart estate' thing? The other tender has included a package worth $2750 with a whole bunch of fancy looking stuff. All we do is minor internet surfing, watch Foxtel and DH would like to set his Xbox up on Xbox live... Hi Miss Windsor, We are in stage 11 on Grove St and we have gas, just a little ahead of you, got our colour selection appointment soon. There was a stage where we were told that they were checking if there was water to the plot which we thought was odd, but in the end it was all there. Try and get a copy of your bushfire assessment report and just see what it shows. Also if you can get a copy (may be able to find one around somewhere on the internet) of AS 3959 regarding bushfire compliance. There are many ways to satisfy the mandatory requirements of the standard. What was your assessed BAL rating? Also with the telstra fibre optics smart estate stuff, try get a friend who knows about this stuff and knows you to help decipher how far you want to go with connecting your house. We like being connected up in our rooms so we will be making sure we take full advantage of the infrastructure Wish you all the best. Once you signed the contract, they will find millions excuses to charge you. And have seen their sites unfinished for a long time. 4 24834 As title suggests, looking at using the interlocking Pentablock stacked stone products to replace failing timber retaining… 0 17880 I am building in claymore NSW and this is shown in the building envelope plan. … 0 10039 |