We've got a dumpster.

[xiphias]

So, the most difficult part of this whole "fixing the hole in the roof" process will be getting a permit for it.

Okay. To reiterate what we were up against. . . .

960-962 Main Street is a beautiful old Victorian/Queen Anne house in Melrose, which was a three-family rental property for the past fifty years, and has been neglected. The third floor apartment has a deck out front.

This deck sits on top of a roof that covers a porch on the second floor and a stairwell that goes from the ground to the second floor landing.

That roof had the worst grade of roofing material there is on it, installed wrong. It then had a not-up-to-code, no-building-permit deck installed on top of the roofing material, incorrectly.

The two-foot hole in the roof was bound to happen eventually. We knew it would happen, even before we bought the house. And it finally did. Fortunately, merkcomet's Dad, werefrog, is a roofer and is really being incredibly nice about REALLY lowballing the job.

And the work proceedes well.

I mean, Dave and his father have already:
1, Taken down the crappy, poorly-built deck and put the bits here and there.
2. Ripped up all the rotting wood in the roof
3. Replaced it with GOOD wood
4. Covered the roof area with roofing paper to be a temporary roof until MY father comes by and gets the measurements he needs for putting the deck back on, but RIGHT this time

After this, what needs to be done is:

5. My Dad comes by and marks out on the roof where the support posts for the deck will be, makes the posts, and puts them onto the roof.
6. Dave and his father install the actual roofing material -- the GOOD stuff, and flash around the posts.
7. Dad and I rebuild the deck.

Here's the thing: I don't have the permits for all of this yet. I tried to get them Monday -- it was Patriots' Day -- City Hall closed. Tuesday, I discovered that there were all SORTS of things I needed to do to get the permit. Today, I've been doing them.

Among these things has been getting a 10 cy dumpster to put all the stuff we took off of the roof into. Except they were out of 10 cy dumpsters, so we got a 15 cy one. By the way, "cy" is short for "cubic yard." Those of you who think in base 10 instead of base 12 may wish to think of it as a "15 cubic meter dumpster." It's pretty close.

I paid them an extra $25, and they took the old broken water heater that we had in the basement, and the busted 27 inch TV. 'Cause you can't just throw those out, because water heaters are relatively big, and metal, and televisions have lots of toxic heavy metals in them.

So, now we've got a dumpster for a week. Anyone need to dump something big? I figure we can also clean out our basement at the same time as doing the roof.

The permit office told me that I need to get a site plan. By a surveyor. For this work.

I think they are mistaken: I can't imagine why I'd need to get a surveyor involved in order to remove a deck, fix a roof under it, and put the deck back. All of that is within the footprint of the house.

Comments

[unquietsoul5.livejournal.com]

This sounds very weird. We needed no such thing when we replaced all three decks on our building last summer (which also went into the original footprint space) nor have we needed a surveyor for any of our basement project (which is still on going).

And Cambridge has some of the toughest rules for repair/construction work in the state.

[steelwngs.livejournal.com]

Would you mind if I tossed a car muffler into the dumpster? My asshat of an upstairs tennant decided to replace his muffler and then leave the old one on the lawn of my house.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

That would be fine. If you need directions, email me at ian@io.com.

[bikergeek.livejournal.com]

You need a surveyor because long ago, some selectman in Melrose had a brother-in-law who was a surveyor, and the selectman wanted to guarantee said b-i-l an income.

[cellio]

No actual knowledge; just guessing: perhaps the surveyer is to ensure that the work doesn't encroach any easements and stuff. Yes, you already had a roof/deck and you aren't changing the footprint, but if that work was illegal in the first place (no permits) and it encroached something, you might not be permitted to just replace it. It's sort of like building renovations and code (or the ADA): so long as you don't touch it you can remain in violation of current rules, but as soon as you so much as pry out a nail you are subject to all the new rules. And locales can have goofy rules about all sorts of things; the in-laws in Toronto say their house has to occupy no more than 42% of their lot (that's a number that has "compromise" written all over it), and we are not permitted to put an AC compressor within 15 feet of our property line (on any side, including the street). Goofy stuff.

And I wouldn't discount the protectionaism aspect (some lawmaker was once in bed with the surveyors' union), either. :-)

Surveyer???

[wargoddess.livejournal.com]

Sounds fishy to me. I know that in RI you can go ahead with a build if it is an emergency situation and get a permit after with no penalty. I've never heard of needing a surveyer for something so trivial as a porch.

That offer to dump stuff; does that include bodies?

>^,^<