It never rains...

...It pours.

As the old saying goes. It is the excessive storm water discharge rates that the council is worried about. Evidently, the large roof size is capable of catching more rain than is permitted to be discharged into the storm water drainage systems due to fear of flooding said systems.

So the standard solution is to install a retention water tank that acts as a storm surge buffer tank.

More details and information on detention and retention water tanks can be found here.

An exemption may be applied for (which we have done).

We are currently waiting a response from Hobsons Bay council.

Further information will be forthcoming, if not the biblical flood itself!

Does size matter?

Evidently it does.

We found out at our contract appointment that Hobsons Bay council has a 9m building height limit.

Our Waldorf with the 2590mm first floor ceilings comes to 9070mm.

So, is 7cm too big?

We're hoping not and we've applied to the council for dispensation. That is a 6-8 week wait. Hopefully that can be considered at the same time as the submission of the plans for approval, as they are somewhat related.

If they do not budge, then the only (not utterly expensive) option is to revert back to the standard first floor ceiling height of 2440mm.

The expensive option is to lower the roof pitch from 30 degrees, to less, which we'll consider if we need too.