Floor plan changes for end-terrace house from the developer

The ground floor was almost completely brick-built (I first thought it would also be "poured" as concrete, but apparently not)

I only see the concrete wall that separates the toilet from the stairwell and the refrigerator from the cloakroom. And above that, the front wall of the storage room.

The other two parties we talked to made it a 1.20m half wall, I think we want to remove it entirely and maybe have about 10cm edge at tub height instead, I think.

No, one point twenty half wall sounds good, that is the head end of the tub. Make the front wall on the long side of the tub also one point twenty, and leave a wide bath salt recess there.

We are currently thinking a bit about "outside". Since it is a pre-planned row house block and generally no large plot, we also have little say in some things or already more faits accomplis than an individual builder has. Fundamentally, there is also a lot of recommendation to plan outside, but something like moving the house or similar was never an option for us anyway.

Somehow I always only have small partial excerpts myself, so sorry in advance. Therefore, here the surroundings added a bit with my wonderful paint skills (we are in red). Maybe the railway tracks are even a bit lower, but we definitely float above them, I could check if I can find elevation data for it. Otherwise, directly to the south from us there is just the neighbor's garage first and then not much at all.


In our ground floor plan you can see the entire plot, even though overall dimensions are missing:
[ATTACH alt="1693218406854.png"]81426[/ATTACH]

And then we have this section with a few more contour lines of our garden (Nope, I also don’t have a larger excerpt here, I would like to have one as well, I will see if I can possibly get it) So we do have a bit of a slope in the terrain (about 90cm across the plot side)
[ATTACH alt="1693218242146.jpeg"]81425[/ATTACH]
On the right side of the plan drawn in green is our "mandatory hedge", which is set in an urban development contract: hornbeam hedge towards the street with 5 plants per 1m.

The developer is doing this for us:
- Basically, with ground work, "height differences to the development and new building heights will be adjusted" and "in the area of the open spaces and gardens, height equalization will be carried out by locally available soil, or if necessary, by delivered soil/topsoil." Later also in the contract "Terrain modeling will be carried out depending on the situation." (which I think here means laying embankments?)
- Partition wall to the neighbor made of sand-lime brick masonry with joint smoothing
- Pave terrace (here the question is, do we want to extend it, if yes, by how much)
- Plant the mandatory hedge (actually we would like to have an access to the street there, i.e. a gate in the hedge or similar, but we’ll see if we can try to clarify that with the city after handover, or if maybe the developer can still do it)
- (not on this) Paving driveway (+ prefabricated garage)

At some point, someone from the developer will probably get in touch with us (at least that was announced to us, if I remember correctly), where it will probably be about whether we want to enlarge the terrace and possibly also about the embankment. But it doesn’t hurt to already think about it basically beforehand.

A few of our neighbors have apparently requested an enlargement of their terraces, roughly like this:
[ATTACH alt="1693221075050.png"]81427[/ATTACH]
But I actually think a green strip next to the terrace is not a bad idea? You don’t have to pave everything over, right? But how wide makes sense as a minimum? 50cm? 80cm? Will anything grow there? (as can be seen at the very top, the terrace orientation is almost due south and there is no tall building to the south or similar) But I also think a bit, "it has to fit sizewise with the slabs" (which we don’t yet know either). But my thought right now would still be something like this:
[ATTACH alt="1693221288828.png"]81428[/ATTACH]
And then left/right place a small flower bed and/or a herb box or something similar? Honestly, we have zero clue about gardens and stuff but I think our plot is manageable enough that we can just try things out. In the worst case, it will be imperfect.

Otherwise, my thought about the embankment is roughly "I think the direction as drawn makes sense and then plant it." It’s not ideal that the garden is "lowered" and we look onto the neighbor’s garage, but with some green planting I think it will be okay.

Besides that, there is our mandatory hedge. There is simply an urban development contract where it is prescribed. But our terrace is also the 2nd row house and somehow I find it odd that we no longer have any access to public land from there (except through the garage). On the other hand, if we shout too loudly there, we might have to grant our neighbor a passage through our garden, so maybe one shouldn’t argue about it like that. But basically, I would find it good if one could get to the street there with bikes or gardening tools as needed, even if it requires a step. I think then we would also have to come up with some compensation measure for the lost piece of hedge (probably with an obligation to maintain it). The question is what would be suitable. Hedge to the parking space? Hedge to the row house neighbor? Plant a tree? We should probably also think about how big the gap should be, aka how many plants moved. I mean, possibly it’s all moot anyway if the city doesn’t cooperate, but it would probably be good if we have a proposal when asking. Basically, I think one could either try to place a gate, something like this:



or try something fancy like a hedge arch or so?

On the one hand it feels strange to "already" deal with the garden. On the other hand, we somehow also need an idea of what we want if we might also want to request things from the developer.

I actually think having a green strip next to the terrace isn't so bad? You don't have to cover everything with paving?

I agree with that, too, and I recommend the local "colorful gardening chat thread" (or whatever it's called, I'm only a lurker there because of my two left green thumbs) for further inspiration.

We also had a gate to the street from our garden and for that we then interrupted the hedge. To still have privacy at that spot, we planted the hedge plants at the height of the gate 1.5 m further back towards the garden, so that you could reach the gate from the garden sideways and from the street you saw hedge plants through the gate. I hope you understand what I mean... Maybe that would be an option for you too, if there is enough space. Then the city would still have its hedge, albeit a few plants further back, and you would have your gate.

You mean something like this?

Your sketch might conflict with the slope. I also don’t believe in any compensatory measures for uprooting a beech tree from your hedge. Whether you want privacy around the gate is something you need to consider. I would tend to start without it, since any path around the corner is impractical and will also take up space in the already small garden. Let the house be finished, sit on the terrace, and then think about where the gate should be best placed. I would only make the terrace as big as needed to comfortably fit the table. For birthday parties, etc., you can also put a beer table set on the grass. Definitely plantings in front of partition walls.