Big Houses

So, I was sitting here at the computer, writing about the house, and getting curious to know how big houses are these days on average. I couldn't find anything very up to date, but I found this link to an NPR story back in 2006:  Behind the Ever-Expanding American Dream House. The best part is the following quote:


"I always wanted a house big enough that my kids could be in their room screaming, and my wife could be in a room screaming, and I could be somewhere else and not hear any of them," he says. "And I think I have accomplished this with this house, because this house is so big that everyone has their own space."

Anyhow, the number they gave was 2,349 square feet- that's the average new house built in 2004.

More Permitting Woes

We got an email last Thursday saying that our permit reviewer was objecting to the definition of Gross Floor Area we used, and didn't accept how we wanted to meet the parking requirements. We lobbied, they deliberated, and as of today they basically rejected our appeals on all fronts. The details get pretty complicated, but basically the city's code has different definitions of Gross Floor Area. This is what determines whether our design is less than the 850 sq.ft. limit for our Secondary Apartment. The one we used is the one that originally was used to evaluate the Secondary Apartment provisions. They're using a definition from new ordinance which has nothing to do with our 850 sq. ft. limit. It makes sense that they would make sure that we're compliant with the new ordinance, but applying its definitions to the Secondary Apartment rules seems like a mistake. The new ordinance explicitly does not eliminate the original definition, and it explicitly is not meant to interfere with or influence the Secondary Apartment rules. In fact, the new ordinance specifically says that the Secondary Apartment section of the code supercedes it in cases of conflict.

Also, they are counting the area of our stairs as livable space twice, as if each stair tread were part of our square footage as well as the space below that tread, too. But you can't fight City Hall. We set out to build a house under 850sq.ft., and changing our design to fit the way the permitting office works is just going to have to be a part of that project.

Permitting Woes

The good news is that we got our life safety permit and our tree permit easily. The bad news is that Trinity taped them to the upper window sash, and they both got ripped up when she opened the lower sash.

Morning Mission to the Permitting Office

This morning Trinity and I went down to One Texas Center with her drawings, freshly stamped and ready for submission. Shout out to Kevin A. for taking one of those pictures.