Building Inspector vs. Pole Barn

s219 · Mar 27, 2014

vabiker23518 said:
What county in VA are you in? Hopefully NOT Lunenburg!

James City County

NoTrespassing · Apr 7, 2014

s219 said:
Latest news:

I spoke with the good folks at CHA Pole Barns this afternoon, and they are willing to make design changes and beef up specs to satisfy the inspector. Sounds like they have learned to willingly accomodate this kind of thing over the years. Since it will only make the building better (see great points by Eddie) this works out good in the end.

Still waiting for a price from an engineer to analyze footings for our soil type, as requested by inspector.

I did learn that I might have been able to skip the whole permit application process since my land is zoned agricultural, if I could claim legitimate "farm use". However, I ran my planned uses by another county official (one with no dog in the fight) and they determined that I won't qualify as "farm use" just by parking a tractor in the barn and keeping chickens/ducks on the property in the future. That phone call potentially opened up another can of worms, as the county is in the midst of revising private property poultry regulations. They wanted my name and phone number just in case they need to tell me more about what I can and can't do on my land in the future.....

I would have hit "end" on my cell phone as soon as they asked for my name and number.

bucktaker · Apr 7, 2014

I claimed Ag use for both my outbuildings, never was checked. But I made sure they were erected to Code Plus as i didnt want structure issues later on

bmaverick · Apr 11, 2014

teejk said:
... I managed to sell the property at only a $60,000 loss. Worth every dime to escape New York state.

You got that one RIGHT!!!!

We got out with a mere $12K loss. But, in two years if staying, the taxes would be more than the loss. The Empire Taxation State of NY no longer gets my support.

I agree about the uplift. Seen a mere 80x40 runin shed, two story tall, uplifted and moved 200 yards across an open field. all the posts came out of the wet soil perfectly while three psts snapped off. The runin is full intact otherwise. This was to store a tractor and round bales for horses. Not sure what the farmer is going to do next with it. I pass this every day into work.

SPYDERLK · Apr 11, 2014

s219 said:
Here, you need a permit for anything over 200 sq.ft. At my old place, I built several small sheds just to stay under that limit. I wanted a single bigger barn at our new house, hence the 20x20 (which still isn't that big really). I'm starting to remember why I avoided permits before...

Strange. Not here.

s219 · Apr 13, 2014

Thought I'd update that I finally got my permit approved and picked it up last Wednesday. Spent $350 for engineering to confirm the footings were going to be OK for gravity loads, however they noted that the local soil was not going to be good enough backfill to resist wind loads (not uplift, but sideways bending/twisting of the 4x6 posts). So now we have to backfill the entire post hole with concrete mix (7-8 80# sacks per hole). And I will need to have an inspector check and sign off on the footing holes prior to them being filled (they didn't find it humorous when I exclaimed "you mean you need to inspect a hole in the ground???") . Other than that, we're good to go. I will start a new thread with some progress pictures.