On the darkest day of the year we received some really great news regarding our new home. After an eight week wait and a lot of back and forth, we were finally issued a new permit for our revised stormwater management plan. This new plan eliminates the giant underground storage system and gives us credit for having a green roof, something the watershed district has never done in the past.
Beyond the (hopefully) cost saving of not having to bury a bunch of giant storage pipes, we will have significantly less maintenance involved with the new system, which will trap/filter stormwater in a more natural fashion by leveraging permeable materials under our artificial lawn and the gravel overflow parking parking area. It also eliminates the need for a rain garden, which ate up a lot of space.
Now that the plan’s been approved, we can start developing a more detailed landscaping plan. The engineering firm will do the functional/structural components and then turn it over to our landscape designer to detail the material finishes and plantings. We’ve got all winter to work on it and get estimates. Fingers crossed we get a warm, dry, early spring for installation.