That might have been a better argument than Clayton Ruby's he he. The daughter is stupid, I'm sorry to say.
Toronto couple built an addition to house without permits told to tear it down.
- Thread starter james t kirk
- Start date
The city bylaws are a bloody maze. I wanted to erect a 10 foot high fence in my backyard (to keep FUJI from spying on my nude sunbathing wife) and was told it cannot exceed 6 feet or something silly like that. Now, I hear some folks are converting garages to living spaces (can you imagine humans living in garages?).
spent a lot of years as a professional deck builder. when we did private jobs that were not for mass builders we found a loophole around the permits. if it was not attached to the house or the ground you didn't need a permit. so sometimes we put them on little floating pads and would butt it up tight to the house but not attach.
Typical old Toronto house.Here's a pic of their house. I'm assuming the addition the newer part on the right??
Flatten it and build something decent like the 905 does.
Yes that's 416 planning. Anyway this post is mundane truth is nobody really cares what happens to that ugly house.
Sometimes you'll see contractors tear an entire old house down, but keep 1 wall.
They then build an entirely new house around that one wall and call it a renovation as opposed to new construction. I believe this allows them to get around side lot widths and shit like that.
Personally, if your building in the old part of the city - I don't give a fuck about side lots. If you've only got a 20 foot wide lot, then build it up to the lot line as far as I'm concerned.
Laughable.
People who live in the city don't want 905 style housing, or 905 anything. 905 = commuter wasteland. Houses built around garages with double driveways and mini vans in every driveway and green Pressure Treated wood everything as far as the eye can see. And dust. Everywhere is dust from all the damn dump trucks forever hauling aggregate and dirt.
No thanks.
Enjoyment of property means different things, not just running around in the backyard.
Exposure to the sun, lighting through windows, physical barriers obstructing views, not feeling closed in.
I'm not saying I'ld like to have a backyard parking lot next door, but what does that mean, it's gloves off and carte blanche for everyone?
And it's not just that one neighbour, its the neighbours beside them and on the other side too.
I know there's plenty of red tape but rest assured if there were no building restrictions or regulations, it would be a fucking disaster.
If you read my post closely, I've mentioned that they probably thought they wouldn't get a variance passed.
I don't think it has anything to do with money.
I'm in the industry and let me tell you, what they tried to pull off isn't ballsy, it's fucking retarded.
Trying to pull off an addition like that, breaching existing setbacks to that extent, I can't believe they could be that stupid.
Do you have any idea how nosey neighbours are when you do something like this, how they talk, how shit hits the fan, and most of the time they won't confront you.
But you have to be stupid or arrogant to disregard this.
They deserve what they got. Even how they responded, bullshit they're throwing around about suicide and whatever else, whining about being victims.
They tried to bully their way through and they don't give a fuck about anything else or nobody.
So you know what, Fuck Them.
So I can't just rebuild my derelict piggery?
What the self-pitying owners are missing is that the City is really saying, 'Too bad you didn't 'maintain the fabric' of your shed, as responsible owners have done since the first buildings humans made. We won't force you to demolish it on our time-table, but it does have to go; if we'd been more on the ball, you'd never have been allowed to build there in the first place. When you finally grasp that reality, tear it down and put your new shed in a better place'
You left out '…built from materials scientifically optimized to last only the couple of decades before today's buildings are expected to be replaced'. The house in that picture is well into its second century, and could easily see a third if it isn't 'improved' by too many irresponsible owners.
What? they should have said, "Fuck the law, give up, these people are too stubborn"? Sorry, these morally bankrupt idiots put themselves to $200,000 in their own costs and ran City's costs t $500K, and lost all along the way. They should pay the entire shot, the house is easily worth more, even without the addition. Given their lack of respect for legal requirements and conventions of the right way to do things, I cant imagine it was built to worthwhile standards.
Except that forces your neighbour to turn over his property to you as part of your building site. Even tip-up construction will require some feet on ground that isn't yours. The point of the setback is to give you a right to do your build and maintain your house from your own property because you don't need your neighbour's land to do either.
A touchy subject for me, because my neighbour's grandfathered setback is just six-inches and his polite but pre-occupied carpenters have trashed a strip of my garden just about the width the current bylaw's setback would have required. To say nothing of me hosting their scaffold all through the build, because that would be less damage than repeated incursions. And they'll be back for the eavestroughing and downspout. Not likely, however, until the neighbour notices the water coming through where the old and new foundations join, because he's not the type to inspect if he has to say please to do it.
Lot-line building, like conventional setbacks only works because and if it is the convention pretty much everyone builds to. But it sorta amounts to building just half a semi at a time if you don't. It's the exceptions that make trouble, and the couple in this story of sorrow insisted on acting as if they were exceptions all they way to the OMB and back again. Today's instalment mentions another OMB appeal as a possibility.
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Well basically that would mean removing all the drywall or whatever they have on the walls/ceiling plus pulling out most of the insulation (hope they didn't spray-foam) so that the inspector can see all the structure and wiring and what-not. Plus digging out to show you put in proper footings, plus exposing all the HVAC systems. They won't let you just open up a couple of spots and pass the whole place on that. Plus there's the whole over the limit to deal with. Can't get a variance for it so it has to be removed.
I thought the article said they would NOT have been approved if they had applied for a permit. If that's true and they chose to fight it, TOUGH TACOS for them. Think of the chaos if everyone could just ignore the laws and just get an exemption after the fact. I don't blame the city for not backing down. And their lawyer daughter hopefully learned a nice life lesson.
Send in the dozers!!!
Send in the dozers!!!
Dumb
FAST
Actually...thats why they went ahead and did it anyway, they knew they were NOT going to ever get approval...really stupid.
FAST
It doesn't really say that.....
And for all we know, if they had played by the rules and played nice with the neighbours, they might have gotten their variance.
I think they just didn't want to pay the fees and deal with the red tape.
