Anyone remember my story of the house collapsing?
 

Well, for a quick refresher....... https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...ollapsing.html

Annnnnnnnnnnnyway, walking up my road today, coming back from the airport and 8 days away, and I was greeted with..... (see pic below)

Bit of a shock, but a pleasent one, means we will have nothing there for the next 6 months minimum, the the planning and fun begins!

Aye it happened about a year ago. Apologies for not following the thread though

About 5 months ago to be more accurate. Living next to it for that time has been long enough.

Happy to see the demolition guys moving in there, just hoping the planned replacement is tasteful.

so for you its lasted more like a 12 month than 5. sorry to hear.

Yeah very much so mate, but its all god :) Main thing is we were allowed back in our house lol.

Swines started work this morning with grinders and other heavy power tools at about 8.15 Im still trying to get some sleep from being messed up with time zones etc lol

Hope you're getting some form of rental for the use of your ground?

Is that the game where each one of you takes turns to carefully pull away one of those silver sticks without the whole thing collapsing?

Is that your Pug holding the fence up? ;)

thats such ashame, had they come to us we could have under pinned without needing to remove material to replace with concrete, therfore preventing collapse.

tbh i bet the owners are gonna be unhappy then rather please considering the under pinners will now have to make a rather large payout for the reuslts lol

lol the underpinning was deemed poor quality apparently, so there are now insurance implications for them too.
As for the developers, I spoke to Pat again today, and get the impression they are really not bothered. Large sum of money £900k, but the land alone is worth that, especially IF they can get permission for a substantial new build.

The house was already considered pretty knackered, and they were told NOT to touch the basement level. The house sits in a basin so was prone to knackered foundations.

Out of interest, how do you underpin without removing anything first?
In this case they simply over cooked it, and dug it all out for a basement flat.

As for the pug, hell no, the scooby and mondeo out of shot are mine lol

Brendan, Jenga..... seems that way.
The demolition crew have been good, coming to say what they are doing, explaining their plans, and how they will be putting up new fencing.

You underpin by boring down 20-30 feet or more over the entire floor with hole a few feet apart. Then you remove alternating section of the foundations . You tie in vertical reinforcing rods from the hole with horizontal rods and concrete the whole lot in together. Houses that have had subsidence and have been underpinned properly are far safer bets long term than those that have, in some cases, quite basic foundations.

you have my sympathys. hang in there.

Yeah I know that bit, just wondered what "we could have under pinned without needing to remove material " meant.

Sadly according to the engineers, the underpinning that had been done was minimalistic, but the issue was caused by the developers then digging out almost the entire basement area to build an unauthorised basement flat.

The ground floor of the house is coming down today. Should all be over by the end of next week.
Ground filled, and the who summer filled with daylight through windows that have not seen it for over 100 years, peace and quiet, and a feeling of safety :)

Cheers Dan, the worry and upset passed quickly, once we were allowed to move back in. The initial evacuation was the big shock. A simple call to the police, 5 mins later 2 units arrived. Within the next 10 mins another 6 or 7 had arrived, the cheif inspector had turned up to take control of the scene, and the entire road was closed, and filled with emergency service vehicles.
If I had charged a quid for each visitor to the scene to see the collapsing victorian house, I could have bought the land off them lol.

Well, another little update...

The plot of land is now for sale, and the original developer is in debt to the tune of £23m
Shame that! Even reposessed his Aston, boo hoo!

Anyway, the whole thing starts over again now. What sort of person/company is going to get the land. What scheme will they draw up, and most of all, how is it going to affect the house I live in?

Let the fun begin.

Would love to know the asking price of the land.
Not looking forward to seeing what they do with the current foundations though. Scary!

If you have the cash you may want to consider putting in an offer for the land. Then you can determine what is built on it, and you may well make some cash in the process. Its not as if you will have to travel far to keep an eye on the project ;)

I have no money, and even if I did, it would never be as much as I would need. Dont think I have earned that much in life yet lol.

Wish I did though, as you say, there is a killing to be made, but would just love to see the old house back there. I miss it. (apart from loving the extra light, im gonna miss that too)

Snazy, I would pay close attention to any plans submitted. Knowing what the previous people did I wouldn't be surprised if they try to put as many flats there as they can fit. :(

Spot on mate, im gonna be checking the planning website daily to know whats going on there. In the current climate im expecting both big plans and big bribes.

To be honest, the primary concern is ground works. Once they get that all secure, so there is no more shifting, my mind will be at rest, and I might finally be able to get the decorating finished. Living in a stripped house for 2-3 years sucks lol. Knowing the house is not gonna fall into an even bigger hole will be nice.

After that, then I will worry about whats being planned for the plot. Im expecting modern, and big either way. Nothing that will suit the space between 2 1890's houses! But apparently the council dont demand that anyway.

Will be nice to finally see the hoardings go down, and be able to see out onto the street off to the sides once more.

FWIW

When and if you do complain to the application for whatever is proposed do your research on how to complain properly to the application.

There are *good* things to say that the planning officer will have to consider and +bad* things like "my house value is being affected". There are some very specific points that can really affect a decision if worded correctly, saxoboy would definately be able advise you on what to say. When it happens though feel free to drop me a PM and I can give you some pointers.

Chop

Cheers Chop.
Gonna be realistic about it when it comes to their planning.
Having experience of what they listen to and don't.
I will of course be looking for help when the time comes.

First things first, I wanna see who gets it.

Sounds like a good time to get yours on the market too maybe somone will buy the lot :) eitherway it is a PITA.

Not mine to sell. Either way they would not be allowed to knock this house down. Unless, like with the other one, there was an unfortunate accident and it collapsed.

Thats the next worry though, if the buyer is gonna be stupid about it, and greedy.

Well here we go again, a "new" owner, and a new pan submitted. This time it's quite nice, but still stuck witness the issue of land movement.
Currently trying all avenues, from architects, to developers, from building control to the local mayor, to try and get some assurances on the safety and stability of our place.

Sadly I'm at a loss and don't have a clue how to go about it all, so have just sent a plea for assistance to them all with a hint of a threat of legal action if anything should happen.

I have sent pictures of the damage being caused, detailed my concerns about the concrete being removed from the foundations, and requested someone carry out a complete survey of our property and land BEFORE work starts.

Let's see if anyone even replies.

Hope it all turns out well in the end Snazy. You have got enough trouble on your back without all that too.

Les

lol it comes in dozens Les, im awaiting a few more issues to pop up or I just wont feel complete lol.
I have fired of some emails today to all sorts of bodies asking for guidance and advice, but right now dont have a clue who i should be contacting, or the best course of action.

Considering opposing planning, but last time i did that with these reasons I was told it was not valid opposition.

mm, only taken me 2 years to spot that question,,,, lol sorry

basicly you can inject material below thats kinda like expanding builders foam. You put enough in the underlying ground that it stabalises the movement and prevents it from collapsing.

http://www.uretek.co.uk/

lol no worries about the delay mate, nothing has happened til now.
Just got an email back from the local mayors office saying they are following up on the matter and have got another body involved in the matter too.

Cheers for the info though mate, its all stuff I can use to help my case and suggested courses of action :)

no probs.

was the underlying issue of why it was collapsing ever found out? was it bad under pinning?

The collapse was a direct result of nothing holding the house up, basement completely removed. Lol that's my take on it anyway. Nothing official was ever said, just an accident as far as they are concerned.

The developer hopefully lost a lot of money, now I just want to make sure ours stays. I have taken over tenancy now so am pushing as hard as I can.

ah righto.