Imagine starting to build a new home and you discover only too late that the ground is too soft for regular footings. The cost of starting over would be immense and if you don’t realise until a year after the building work is finished, you could end up with a structure that is completely uninhabitable.
Unfortunately, this can be a big issue if you don’t survey the land where you intend to build ahead of time. There are many factors that could affect how you build and these are discovered by geotechnical engineers. Here’s why you need them.
Avoid Future Problems
Building a house or any other kind of construction can be risky if you simply start building without doing any preparation or research beforehand. You need to know exactly how the soil functions in your area and whether you can build a basic foundation or something more elaborate. The last thing you want is to deal with problems years down the line because you failed to plan ahead. Geotechnical engineers will assess your area and determine what potential issues you need to plan for. They can also help you design the house and garden to avoid problems in the future.
Assess Slope and Drainage
If the land you’re building on has poor drainage, this will need to be accounted for when building. Otherwise, you’ll end up with a flooded basement, or a garden that never really grows properly because the rainwater doesn’t drain and leaves pools. There are so many factors to take into consideration when planning your building and garden that you’ll need to look at before you even start building. The right slope for runoff water will help keep your building secure and dry, for example, while a slight miscalculation could have you battling mould and damp for years to come.
Design the Right Foundations, Walls, and Other Structures
Depending on how your land is formed and a variety of other factors, the actual structures you build will need to adapt. For example, if you are building on bedrock, the foundation style will be different than building on a sandy base. In order to keep your structure stable and safe, you need foundations and walls to be designed for the specific terrain that you are building on.
Before you build any type of structure, you need to be sure that it will stand the test of time. Having a good idea of what potential problems the building site could incur will help you design around them as you build your new home or office. Here at Integrate Designs in Birmingham, we can help you figure this out, so give us a call today
