Preliminary siting received by email – grand outdoor room and wider garage deleted

Last week we received the preliminary siting from our Sales Consultant, Melissa.  The siting requires some design amendments due to driveway gradient/slope, fall on site, neighboring habitable windows and garage wall height on boundary.

The proposed design amendments to fit the Metricon Nolan 45 on to our block includes:

• A 307mm step-down to Garage to achieve the minimum grade driveway access
• Deletion of Grand Outdoor Room extension – to be left as the standard Outdoor Room
• Deletion of eaves to the south elevation of upper floor.

What was also missing on the preliminary siting is the 600mm width extension to the garage.

The removal of the Grand Outdoor extension and 600mm extension to garage is a bit disappointing.  As an alternative to the 3.3m extension of the Grand Outdoor Room, we have requested our Sales Consultant to include a 1m extension to the outdoor room.

It seems we cannot get closer than 2324mm to the fence of the neighbour south of us due to overshadowing habitable windows and as a result a width extension to the garage is not possible. The preliminary siting shows the maximum wall height on the southern side of the building to be 5.8m to top of gutter.

Does anyone know any regulations about how close we can get to the neighbour (reduced setback) as we would really like the garage extension even if its only nominal amount?  Is it difficult to get building approval for overshadowing habitable windows?

Edit [7/12/2011] – Thanks for a reader for posting a reply on HomeOne – click here to read.

C&K