Originally published on the old forum April 2016.

Had to happen, the lack of a building warrant has pushed our start date back. I had started the process back in November and having been encouraged to do so, handed over the submission of the warrant application to a local surveyor well versed in our chosen method of construction.

Without boring you all regarding the reasons why, the application wasn't actually submitted until the end of January and there have been delays in getting BC queries answered. We are almost there now, with the final list of queries being minor and with luck everything should be in tomorrow and will have our warrant by the end of the week. 

We have however done what we can on site, bringing in an access road,

  

creating a hard standing working area for the contractors / crane / concrete wagons, and dug down to the level the house will be built on.

  

We do thankfully have good solid ground (being a free draining shaley type clay and rotten rock) to build off so need nothing more than a standard concrete strip foundations.

I do now have a mountain of the aforementioned shaley clay (which you can see in the background of the last picture) to use on site as the topsoil coverage was only around 200mm or so. We are planning to build up a terrace at the front of the house along with some general landscaping which should use up most if not all of what we have. Meantime I've been busy picking off pieces of rock/stone from the surface of the heap of spoil, larger pieces for landscaping / in the garden and smaller stuff to use in rubble / french drains.