Edmonton Journal

Shaken homes, angry neighbours

Increasing infill constructi­on causes headaches

- ELISE STOLTE

Damaged fences, flooded basements, homes shaken so hard tiles crack and drywall fractures.

One city councillor says damage complaints from infill constructi­on are escalating and city staff say there’s little they can do.

“For me, that’s not a good enough answer,” said Coun. Ben Henderson, who’s been pushing administra­tion for a better solution. “I think it’s a big problem.”

“Inconsider­ate builders are ruining things for the good builders out there and underminin­g trust,” he added.

Edmonton started handing out postcards this year urging builders to read a new list of good-neighbour principles. If any damage is done — if a builder is careless or inept — it’s all on the neighbour to sue for damages.

No hard data on the number of complaints is available. But Edmonton’s infill program is leaving even pro-density residents frustrated. Horror stories are easy to find.

The headache for artist Patricia Mykietowic­h started four weeks ago.

“You expect through the excavation you’ll have some vibrations. But by Day 2, it escalated to such an extent, pictures were actually sliding off the wall. My house was literally shaking and it was shaking for hours.”

Next door to her Westmount heritage home, an excavator was pulling down chunks of concrete foundation and smashing them against the floor into smaller pieces. Then they excavated, found a buried backyard pool and broke concrete again.

Newly installed tiles cracked in Mykietowic­h’s kitchen, the flooring now feels loose underfoot and hairline cracks appeared in several rooms.

In Garneau, communicat­ions profession­al Bridget Stirling was excited when she heard neighbours were tearing down the ramshackle rental beside the home she rents.

But two weeks ago, she woke up to banging, watched the excavator bucket hit her deck and felt the house shake violently. The following day, she was living next to a pile of debris and an unfenced excavation. Her fence was torn down and the hole crept well over the property line, almost against the house, she said.

Her partner came home to find a mound of dirt trucked in from a property several blocks away. The builder said he was going to store it there, which is against city bylaws. But even though Stirling called the city, the unfenced piles remain.

Water will flood through the window wells if it rains and she’s worried about the foundation.

“This is how communitie­s end up opposing all infill. … It’s like the wild west out here,” Stirling said. “There needs to be a rapid interventi­on process in place.”

In Riverdale, busker Breezy Brian Gregg has been fighting with the builder next door for a year and has hired a lawyer. Last August, contractor spiled dirt against the 1906 stable he uses as a shed, causing the wall to bow inward.

While backfillin­g, the contractor drove across his yard, Gregg said, despite requests not to trespass. A month later, a furnace cleaner found an exterior pipe had been broken and carbon monoxide was leaking into the home.

Livia Balone, Edmonton’s director of developmen­t and zoning, said residents should talk with the property owner if their fence or garden beds are damaged. They can also call their insurance company or police.

It’s not a city matter, she said. “The zoning bylaw doesn’t monitor the business practices of the builder.”

The community standards branch has rules for dust and noise, but no one controls the amount of vibration. The city formed a constructi­on advisory committee for new neighbourh­oods a year ago and broadened it to examine infill issues a month ago.

Committee member Bev Zubot, a planning analyst with the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues, is asking residents to email her photos and anecdotes.

Many Canadian jurisdicti­ons require security deposits to ensure against damage to public property, and some community leagues suggest a bond could pay for private-property damage, too.

Other residents suggest Edmonton increase fines and prohibit excavation within a half-metre of a neighbour’s fence or landscapin­g.

Edmonton is offering preconstru­ction condition surveys for all homes along the coming Valley LRT Line. Should the city require developers to offer similar third-party inspection­s to adjacent homes? It would at least simplify legal matters.

“It’s worth having a look at,” said Henderson. “Anything we can do to make people better players.”

“We have to step up. … If we were a little more draconian, we might be seeing better behaviour.”

 ?? SHAUGHN BUTTS/EDMONTON JOURNAL ?? Bridget Stirling and Jeff Cruickshan­k live in Garneau next to a vacant lot where a builder is illegally storing dirt.
SHAUGHN BUTTS/EDMONTON JOURNAL Bridget Stirling and Jeff Cruickshan­k live in Garneau next to a vacant lot where a builder is illegally storing dirt.
 ?? SUPPLIED ?? Bridget Stirling came home to find dirt spilling into the window wells of the Garneau house where she lives.
SUPPLIED Bridget Stirling came home to find dirt spilling into the window wells of the Garneau house where she lives.
 ?? SUPPLIED ?? During infill constructi­on last summer, dirt was piled against a 1906 stable Brian Gregg uses as a shed, bowing in a wall.
SUPPLIED During infill constructi­on last summer, dirt was piled against a 1906 stable Brian Gregg uses as a shed, bowing in a wall.

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