Didn't get all the way through but I have had the same conditions imposed on me for a proposed extension and garage build.
His problem is the size of the build and not having professional help.
The Local authority will not admit it or quite possibly, the planning office don't have a clue, but once you get over a certain size, it seems to trigger a flag with environmental control.
My garage is approx 44sq. metres, the extension, 15sq. metres- thats 473 and 161 square feet for those across the pond! Due, according to environmental monitoring, an area of 'infilled ground' less than 250 metres (820 feet) away, these SOB's applies a condition to the grant of planning permission that required me to undertake 'gas' monitoring.
This would have involved sinking a number of deep holes into the ground (upto 10M-32ft)and taking samples over a six week period after which a report would be written and then sent on to Environmetal control. They would then liase with building control/planning and tell me how I could build it.WTF?
You could imagine how pissed I was as I was looking at about £5K in costs for this alone and I estimated at about a 10-12 week delay whilst deliberations and recommendations were made. This delay would also add in additional cost to the overall programme which I guesstimated to be over £2700 in accomodation cost alone
It was even worse when I discovered that these conditions had not been applied to anyone else in the last 10 years- not even those living directly opposite the ground in question when they had built extensions
The fact that I was only 12 metres (40 ft) inside the limit made it all the more intolerable.
After a particularly bad tempered telephone call with some horrible dickless jobsworth, I got a little tidbit of information and with prompt action by my architect, managed to avoid the gas sampling but instead had to install a gas membrane and what is known as a beam & block floor. The Foundations are to be 1.8M (6ft) at the shallowest point incresing to 2.4M (8ft) at their deepest. However this was due mainly to the proximity of certain types of tree rather than ground type.
The garage too was due to have the same floor construction. However, I argued that since it was a non habitable space, this was not required. I won that round
I had an engineer design a reinforced floating slab to allow for the percieved risk of heave. The inspecting building control officer signed off without a hitch & the slab has since been poured.
A chance conversation with my elderly neigbour reveled that the area of infilled ground was once a pond in the grounds of a large mansion on which he used to skate as a boy. It was filled in, in 1938!!
I beleive that if he had used the services of an architect and a structural engineer to design possibly a floating slab, his costs could have been halved and the project could have run far smoother. Just my 0.2 based on experience!
