Part I Installment 2
UP THE CREEK
With the purchase documents for the tiny, 600 square foot Storybook cottage on Cragmont Avenue underway, and with ideas for expansion already at a furious boil in my mind, I immediately started sketching different ways of turning the place into a proper architect’s magnum opus. Still, something at the back of my mind kept nagging at me, and eventually it came to the fore: the culverted creek. Why had my soon-to-be neighbor Selma Klett even mentioned it, when it was on her property and not mine? Slowly, it dawned on me: the City of Berkeley had an unusual ordinance forbidding any new construction within thirty feet of a creek’s centerline. The imposition of that policy had been quite an economic blow to the many Berkeleyites who happened to live near creeks and, through no fault of their own, found their homes suddenly devalued because they could no longer be expanded.
When I looked into the creek ordinance a bit further, I found that it also covered what Berkeley termed “historic creeks”—in other words, creeks that had once existed but had been culverted at some point in the past. It didn’t matter if a creek had been running in an underground pipe for a hundred years—it was still considered a historic creek, and the creek ordinance still applied to it. Now the question became: is the culvert on Selma’s property—a few feet from the house I was buying—considered a historic creek?
Suddenly feeling some butterflies, I visited Berkeley’s Public Works department and asked them to show me the official creeks map for my neighborhood. And sure enough, there it was: an eight-inch diameter culvert running right down the middle of Selma Klett’s damned driveway. The official Creeks Map was even more alarming—the sixty-foot-wide zone in which you were forbidden from building barreled right through the middle of the property. The Public Works official printed out a copy and I took it home with me. It didn’t take me long to grasp that, if I couldn’t build anything within thirty feet of that red line, there was basically nothing I could build at all.
Talk about butterflies: I was now in a legal contract to pay $625,000 for a property that was essentially locked in amber and could never be expanded. It was the nightmare scenario for an architect, and especially for this architect. I very clearly remember calling Monica Wong that evening, trying to sound calm despite being panicked in the extreme, and asking her if there was a way—any way—to get out of the purchase agreement. She enumerated three reasons a contract could legally be terminated. Two of them didn’t apply—they were probably along the lines of, “Buyer has dropped dead,” or something of that severity. The third loophole, however, could be invoked if the buyer failed to obtain financing. That was our escape hatch, and we were taking it.
“Then that’s what we have to do,” I remember telling Monica in tone of voice I wasn’t used to employing with friends. And bless her, she got us out of the contract just like that, to my indescribable relief.
Shortly after this massive and self-inflicted blunder on my part, we went to visit Selma Klett as a courtesy, just to tell her we’d backed out of the purchase—ironically, because her offhand comment had saved us in the nick of time. We exchanged the expected so-sorry-we-won’t-be-neighbors sentiments, but what sticks in my mind is that, just before we left, Selma made a point of telling us: “I said I wanted you to have that rocking goose, and I meant it.” She wrote out her nephew’s Berkeley address, where the goose apparently resided, and directed me to go there and pick it up—which I did. Selma was a lovely person, and the goose was a lovely rocking goose. To this day, it holds a proud position in the living room of The Crookedest House—a reminder of what could’ve turned into a six hundred thousand dollar mistake.
Next time: We continue house hunting—chastened, but not much wiser...
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| Before we even signed the papers, I'd already put a lot of thought into how I'd remodel the tiny cottage on Cragmont Avenue. Here's my Storybook-ish scheme for a new double garage (there wasn't any); it was to be partly buried in the hillside that sloped up to the house (note steps at right). |
With the purchase documents for the tiny, 600 square foot Storybook cottage on Cragmont Avenue underway, and with ideas for expansion already at a furious boil in my mind, I immediately started sketching different ways of turning the place into a proper architect’s magnum opus. Still, something at the back of my mind kept nagging at me, and eventually it came to the fore: the culverted creek. Why had my soon-to-be neighbor Selma Klett even mentioned it, when it was on her property and not mine? Slowly, it dawned on me: the City of Berkeley had an unusual ordinance forbidding any new construction within thirty feet of a creek’s centerline. The imposition of that policy had been quite an economic blow to the many Berkeleyites who happened to live near creeks and, through no fault of their own, found their homes suddenly devalued because they could no longer be expanded.
When I looked into the creek ordinance a bit further, I found that it also covered what Berkeley termed “historic creeks”—in other words, creeks that had once existed but had been culverted at some point in the past. It didn’t matter if a creek had been running in an underground pipe for a hundred years—it was still considered a historic creek, and the creek ordinance still applied to it. Now the question became: is the culvert on Selma’s property—a few feet from the house I was buying—considered a historic creek?
 |
| The City of Berkeley's official Creeks Map. The yellow rectangle is the property we were in contract to buy; the red line is the "historic creek"—actually, an 8" diameter pipe buried under Selma Klett's driveway. No new construction was allowed within thirty feet on either side of the red line. I was really up the creek. |
Talk about butterflies: I was now in a legal contract to pay $625,000 for a property that was essentially locked in amber and could never be expanded. It was the nightmare scenario for an architect, and especially for this architect. I very clearly remember calling Monica Wong that evening, trying to sound calm despite being panicked in the extreme, and asking her if there was a way—any way—to get out of the purchase agreement. She enumerated three reasons a contract could legally be terminated. Two of them didn’t apply—they were probably along the lines of, “Buyer has dropped dead,” or something of that severity. The third loophole, however, could be invoked if the buyer failed to obtain financing. That was our escape hatch, and we were taking it.
“Then that’s what we have to do,” I remember telling Monica in tone of voice I wasn’t used to employing with friends. And bless her, she got us out of the contract just like that, to my indescribable relief.
Shortly after this massive and self-inflicted blunder on my part, we went to visit Selma Klett as a courtesy, just to tell her we’d backed out of the purchase—ironically, because her offhand comment had saved us in the nick of time. We exchanged the expected so-sorry-we-won’t-be-neighbors sentiments, but what sticks in my mind is that, just before we left, Selma made a point of telling us: “I said I wanted you to have that rocking goose, and I meant it.” She wrote out her nephew’s Berkeley address, where the goose apparently resided, and directed me to go there and pick it up—which I did. Selma was a lovely person, and the goose was a lovely rocking goose. To this day, it holds a proud position in the living room of The Crookedest House—a reminder of what could’ve turned into a six hundred thousand dollar mistake.
Next time: We continue house hunting—chastened, but not much wiser...
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