Subdivision, part 9

The week before our glorious vacation (ahhh. . . vacation!), I called up the Land Use Planner in charge of my subdivision project to ask when to expect the overdue review comments.

She replied that my project was two-thirds of the way down a stack of two thousand, but her personal deadline was four to six weeks after the end of the public comment period. This would put her deadline at July 2 to July 16.

But the Thursday before we left, she emailed me her comments. Because we had talked about the project, she did her review. If I had known it would work like that, I should have called her earlier!

I called her that day and discussed her comments. No project killers:

Provide lot coverage information for the house's new, smaller lot.

Provide a "No Protest Agreement" for any street improvements because the street easement isn't as wide as an arterial usually is. It's not as if we'd be able to stop Seattle from widening the street in any case.

Provide notes on the survey and a photograph showing the existing parking in the basement.

Provide a copy of the 1965 easement referenced on the survey. . . In our conversation, I nullified this point. She didn't read the legal description closely enough to realize that the south parcel had a new easement that overlapped the 1965 easement for the western eastern neighbors.

Provide a note stating that the detached garage will be demolished before transfer of the property, as I was told I would be told. The reviewer, however, said that if we build a house on the new lot, the garage won't have to be demolished. As long as it's an accessory building, it can stay. I'll put a note to that regard on the drawings. Chunlin wants to build a house there, anyway.

And so the next step is to go down to the city and pick up the drawings and make revisions, or is it?

City Light hasn't made comments yet. They might still have a copy of the drawings. They're notorious for being exceptionally slow in reviewing land use projects. Apparently, they only have one engineer reviewing projects for all of North Seattle.

I can't make revisions until all eight copies are available for picking up, or else I'll receive a $300 penalty. The instructions must be followed precisely!

Plans Routing told me to talk to a certain person, who directed me back to the reviewer in charge of the project, who won't be back in the office till Wednesday. I guess I'll just have to wait.