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A big hole in the ground
Mar. 27th, 2007 08:36 amWe went looking at the new apartment yesterday for the final walkthrough and noticed a little issue with the courtyard. It's not there anymore - it's now a big hold in the ground.
The new apartment is in a roughly square building with a central courtyard. You enter through a gate on the street side, walk into the courtyard, and from there climb one of the four exterior (but covered) stairwells - one for each side of the building.
There's four buildings in the complex, and we'd heard from one of the tenants in another building that they had repaired the courtyards as they were "sinking" and that it had taken months to repair. I had imagined an inefficient set of workers digging some holes, filling them with sand and concrete, and being slow in paving it over at the end. I was wrong.
When we came to the building yesterday, the courtyard was gone. We had to enter through the basement and saw that were the courtyard used to be, there's now a 12-foot hole in the ground. The courtyard was built at apparent ground level, above the basement and foundations, and the actual ground level is quite a bit lower than street level. Now I understand how redoing the courtyard can take a few months.
On the other hand, we missed the first major demolition work in a 100 years by a month, and by the time we move in 3-5 weeks the work will be halfway done. The movers won't be happy, but hey it's their job. The biggest issue will be the delivery of the dining table next week and I'm sure we'll manage.
But you can imagine my surprise when we came to the building yesterday...
The new apartment is in a roughly square building with a central courtyard. You enter through a gate on the street side, walk into the courtyard, and from there climb one of the four exterior (but covered) stairwells - one for each side of the building.
There's four buildings in the complex, and we'd heard from one of the tenants in another building that they had repaired the courtyards as they were "sinking" and that it had taken months to repair. I had imagined an inefficient set of workers digging some holes, filling them with sand and concrete, and being slow in paving it over at the end. I was wrong.
When we came to the building yesterday, the courtyard was gone. We had to enter through the basement and saw that were the courtyard used to be, there's now a 12-foot hole in the ground. The courtyard was built at apparent ground level, above the basement and foundations, and the actual ground level is quite a bit lower than street level. Now I understand how redoing the courtyard can take a few months.
On the other hand, we missed the first major demolition work in a 100 years by a month, and by the time we move in 3-5 weeks the work will be halfway done. The movers won't be happy, but hey it's their job. The biggest issue will be the delivery of the dining table next week and I'm sure we'll manage.
But you can imagine my surprise when we came to the building yesterday...
