Yep, back a few months ago we were contemplating a move to a house that would be closer to where my practice is being built. After weighing out all the options we decided that we want to stay in our general vicinity. We really love our house except for 1 thing (explained below) and figured that we would stay here for a few more years. The main reason that we didn't move to where my practice is being built is because we couldn't leave our amazing ward and half ward (the other part of our ward before it split and we lost 'em). The ward near my practice is not 1/10th as good as what we have here in Maple Valley. We have always felt pretty lucky to have ended up in such a great spot. Literally, more friends than we have time for and not b/c of anything special on our part, just so many great people.
So, fast forward a few months down the road. Over that time span I had been working with King County on the 1 thing we don't like about our home...how busy the street has gotten. It is kind of hard to explain so I made these two pictures. The first shows our neighborhood as it was being built.
The second has all the details. Our current and future homes are marked by blue circles. The blue line is the main road from the main entrance. The development was built so that this road had no houses facing it while all others do. This was to avoid having kids out on the main road. Unfortunately, two things have happened. 1) a lot of people in the neighborhood have started to turn off the main road onto our road (red line) to go to the shopping center next door (Safeway, etc) and save 2-3 seconds of travel time. 2) many people that live in other developments around the city have figured out that they don't have to wait at a stop sign and can cut through our neighborhood to avoid the wait. These are the worst b/c they usually travel past our house at very high speeds. The traffic has also increased because they have finished the second half of the development since we moved in over 2 years ago.
I and some of my neighbors worked every angle we could possibly think of to get this problem corrected. We even got our HOA to agree to pay for some speed humps that wouldn't slow down fire trucks (which was our big problem from the county) and install them at our cost and maintain/take liability for, but still the county STILL said no. After getting the final no on the last possible option we couldn't take living on a street that has become so dangerous. At the same time, up higher in our development a much bigger lot became available that's on a cul-de-sac, is a custom design home, near many of our kid's friends, with an amazing view of Rainier and Seattle/Olympic mountains. We really did not want to pony up to the higher mortgage right now, but we couldn't pass up this opportunity to have such an amazing lot, in our ward, near our kid's friends when there were not any others like this available in the school/ward boundaries and would not be in the foreseeable future! I got the approval of my CFO Ronnie Chapman anyway, so I know it will work out.
We will keep posting pictures as it is built. It looks like it will be done late January to February. It depends on how many options we add on during the next few days as we finish the plan with them.
So, fast forward a few months down the road. Over that time span I had been working with King County on the 1 thing we don't like about our home...how busy the street has gotten. It is kind of hard to explain so I made these two pictures. The first shows our neighborhood as it was being built.
The second has all the details. Our current and future homes are marked by blue circles. The blue line is the main road from the main entrance. The development was built so that this road had no houses facing it while all others do. This was to avoid having kids out on the main road. Unfortunately, two things have happened. 1) a lot of people in the neighborhood have started to turn off the main road onto our road (red line) to go to the shopping center next door (Safeway, etc) and save 2-3 seconds of travel time. 2) many people that live in other developments around the city have figured out that they don't have to wait at a stop sign and can cut through our neighborhood to avoid the wait. These are the worst b/c they usually travel past our house at very high speeds. The traffic has also increased because they have finished the second half of the development since we moved in over 2 years ago.
I and some of my neighbors worked every angle we could possibly think of to get this problem corrected. We even got our HOA to agree to pay for some speed humps that wouldn't slow down fire trucks (which was our big problem from the county) and install them at our cost and maintain/take liability for, but still the county STILL said no. After getting the final no on the last possible option we couldn't take living on a street that has become so dangerous. At the same time, up higher in our development a much bigger lot became available that's on a cul-de-sac, is a custom design home, near many of our kid's friends, with an amazing view of Rainier and Seattle/Olympic mountains. We really did not want to pony up to the higher mortgage right now, but we couldn't pass up this opportunity to have such an amazing lot, in our ward, near our kid's friends when there were not any others like this available in the school/ward boundaries and would not be in the foreseeable future! I got the approval of my CFO Ronnie Chapman anyway, so I know it will work out.
We will keep posting pictures as it is built. It looks like it will be done late January to February. It depends on how many options we add on during the next few days as we finish the plan with them.
8 comments:
I am glad your boys will be safer up there and near friends! We are excited to hear updates and see pictures of the progress, good luck with everything! So if Ronnie is your CFO does that mean you will be our DDS?
Three words...
Retractable spike strips
:-D
Congrats on the new house!
Congrats. That's awesome! I can totally see why you'd want to move from that busy street. When we come through your neighborhood, we always comment on how busy that street is, and yes, we are guilty for driving in and out of that side road. Try not to get too stressed through this big change! It's pretty stressful building a home!
"if Ronnie is your CFO does that mean you will be our DDS?" What is your ETA? If it is ASAP then it will be A OK.
You miss us huh? Don't worry, your BFF will arrive ASAP! And then we can P.A.R.T.Y. from AM to PM!
The question that you seem to be forgetting to ask is, "how will this improve my hunting opportunities?" Every other option weighed and question asked regarding the move is irrelevant. So, I'll pose the question for you, how will this move improve your hunting opportunities? Are you closer to the elk now? Can you poach them out your back window? These are the essential questions that must be answered.
I think I would do the same exact thing if I were in your situation. Busy streets are no fun. Good Luck with everything and I'm looking forward to more pictures of the new house.
hey Carson and Marisa, this is Mark Taylor from way back in the day--my sister is moving to the Seattle area and is looking for a job. I'm trying to help her in some small way by contacting the people I know of up there to try to get any leads. Since your email addresses are not posted (good thing), this is the best I could do. I'd be happy to send her resume and such. You can email me at mattwo@princeton.edu.
I hope things are well, just from this blog post, it looks like things are going really pretty great. Not half bad. Hope to hear from you soon.
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