Site Preparation
Site preparation begins with site access. As you can see we staked out where the driveway and parking areas were to be located. The first order of business was to remove the trees and vegetation that was in the way. A backhoe short work of that task.
Larger trees were cut down with a chain saw first and the stumps removed with the bucket. Smaller stuff was just scooped while leveling the area.
This is a fairly large lot and a lot of vegetation needs to be removed not only to fit the house in but there is going to be a lot of parking and driveway area. We made a strong effort to work things around the larger trees and I think we were pretty successful in doing that.
At this point it looks like just a big mess but what is actually happening is that all the trees and vegetation are being collected in piles so they can be loaded in dump trucks and hauled away. This is done with a clam shell bucket on the front of the backhoe. We had 6 trucks full of debris removed.
With most of the debris removed you can now see the trees we managed to save and as you proceed down the page you'll start to see the beginnings of our landscaping plan being laid in place.
The lot is pie shaped and the utilities are located at opposite corners. Here the backhoe is digging the trench for our water line. It extends for about 150 feet to the back of the house.
At the opposite corner of the lot another trench was dug to bring in both electric and phone lines.
The basic design of our driveway is a "U" which will provide an "IN and an "OUT" access. This required two 20 foot culverts 16 inches in diameter.
After the truck dumps the fill in place a backhoe begins the process of leveling the material. Note the stakes outlining where the driveway. You must do this planning up front and have everything staked out before your excavation contractor arrives.
With the driveway roughed out it was time to start leveling the area where the house will eventually sit. A good laser level helps with this task.
Once the area is level the actual location of the foundation can be staked out. The backhoe is working on backfilling a concrete retaining wall my neighbor was kind enough to build 3 feet on my side of the lot line. I didn't mind simply because I had intended to build one anyway so he just saved me the time and expense of constructing this expensive wall. Since it's in my side of the line, it's my wall. We have an agreement to share in the wall's maintenance and in return for his expense I'll allow him the use of my three foot space along the lot line.
	Now for the important part. My wife is standing at the far end of the garage. I took the picture standing at the near end. It will be easy to park four cars side by side in that space.
In this picture my wife is standing at the far corner of the shop and the picture is being taken at the other end of the garage. This garage/shop is about double the size of one in our last house. Hope it's going to be big enough.
This area will eventually be the crawl space under the main section of the house. We designed in a "tall" crawl space that will be almost 5 feet high. I don't like the idea of having to crawl in a crawl space to do repairs someday.
The footers have finally been dug for the house foundation. In this case local codes require at least 24 inches in width and 12 inches in depth. Ours will be 18 inches deep. The garage footers are identical.
Up here on the mountain we do things differently, or so I was told by the building inspectors. There is a certain amount of truth to that too. On the right side of this pic you can see the semi permanent "temporary" electric service I installed per the building inspector and electric company's instructions. It's really the permanent box (200 amp service) with all wires run underground from the street. When the garage wall is constructed the plywood the box is currently attached to will be removed and the box will be mounted to the wall. This will actually move the box back about 6 inches. Not the way I would do it, but one of the most important things you need to know is never, and I mean NEVER argue with a building inspector. Not only will you lose, building inspectors love a good argument. (Probably because they know they're going to win no matter what.) Trust me, get to know your inspectors and listen to them. They are NOT the enemy.
This part of Arizona is volcanic in nature. This makes a cinder driveway and parking area relatively inexpensive, and in my opinion it fits a log home better than a paved driveway anyway. This is the parking area outside the garage. The two 18 foot garage doors will be along a wall on the left side of the picture.
Here you see the access from the street to the parking area outside the garage. Our truck is parked in the "U" shaped area that will take you back out to the street. A section splits off and comes up to the garage area as you can see in the picture.
Here you can see the "IN" section of the driveway. Once entrance is made visitors will have a parking area to the right and garage access will be to the left.
Here you can see the split. Right to parking and left to the garage.
This picture shows the two car visitor parking area.
This is the "OUT" part of the driveway.
This is the view from the front edge of the garage parking area looking out to the street. You can see how many trees we were able to save by carefully planning all this activity.
Although this area is heavily wooded it is still considered desert. The ground is hard clay and when a drenching rain hits the water needs somewhere to go. This is a culvert we built through the trees to collect water from the hill behind the house and direct it out under the driveway to the street. Its a couple feet wide and a foot or so deep and will be lined with river rock when time permits and will remain dry 99% of the time.
That's all for this update. We have now completed everything we can without a building permit. Once our Arizona stamped plans arrive (in about two weeks) we'll obtain our permit and start pouring concrete. Stay tuned....