I have my eye on a plot on Orkney (West Mainland) - it's by far the most attractive I've found at a reasonable price having looked for quite a long time on the west coast and in Sutherland and Caithness. Plan A was to get planning permission and a building warrant while continuing to live in the house I was renting in Sutherland but that got sold from under me so I'm now thinking about new temporary accommodation.

If I can avoid it I'd rather not rent a new place on Orkney - I've already sent enough money down the drain renting.

There's a restriction on building for a couple of months in the spring for the breeding season of the adjoining bird sanctuary. Therefore the build process might drag on.

One option is to go ahead with the plot purchase as quickly as possible then put a caravan or mobile home on the plot. However, Orkney Island Council are dead set against that; their planning guidance says they'll only allow temporary on site accommodation for the minimum period that the law requires (from when you have both planning permission and a building warrant). This is because caravans and mobile homes tend to blow away in Orkney winds and then they get to re-house people and stuff.

Shipping containers don't blow away so much - a quick web search showed found one news item in Iceland of that. Maybe a few screw-in tie downs would be a good idea to stop them sliding a bit, I suppose.

I'm currently renting a 20' one for storage of my stuff (near Dounreay) and had been considering getting one on site for storage and maybe some workshop space.

What I was wondering was whether it'd make sense to get two - one for storage and one for accommodation. Perhaps construct a ply and PUR 'tent' inside the accommodation one being careful not to cut the sheets so they can be recycled into the house later. Other stuff like doors and bathroom wear likewise.

Any thoughts on the legal and practical aspects of this idea?

Hi Ed
my understanding from the Council was that they wanted the caravan removed from site as soon as you moved into the house because too many people were then renting them out. We have been in the house 2 years now and things may have changed.
Our caravan held out to a few 80 mph gales and gusts. We tried to shelter it as much as we could from the prevailing wind, parked the pick up to give a bit of wind break on bad forecasts and it was in the lee of the workshop as much as it could be. Keep it as low as possible and secure it by the chassis, not over the top as the frame is not strong enough. We wedged sleepers under it as well.We also had a bund made with the top soil to act as a wind break too. It was an experience..... one that may not be attempted again but do able.
Cheers Michael

Posted By: TriassicAlternatively you could build the garage first and live in there

Or a substantial garden shed?

I know someone who has been living in an extremely well insulated 8' x 10' here on Skye for 3 years now while slowly doing a total (i.e. back to bare walls & no roof) refurb on an old house. Being a refurb however does at least mean that potable water is available on tap and there are 'facilities' (albeit very basic, and a 30m walk from the shed).

Here on Skye there is the "Highland Shed Compnay" who do some very well framed and clad sheds. Maybe there is an Orkney equivalent?

Posted By: TriassicAlternatively you could build the garage first and live in there

Not sure I'm going to bother with a garage for the time being. One attraction of that plot, against many of the others which I've seen, is that it's feasible (though slightly awkward) to live there without driving which it's marginally possible I might have to (eye problems which are under control but a slight background worry).

That'd work, though, in the time between getting planning permission and a building warrant. I'd suspect that the longest time will be getting the planning permission. Apart from anything else, it'd be nice to have somewhere marginally “proper” to work to deal with the planning application.

Posted By: djhGet a container to act as storage - especially of a couple of tons of sand or similar. Then get a caravan to live in and park it in the lee; also tied down with a bunch of ground anchors? Would the council let you do that?

Practically that probably makes a lot of sense but given that they specifically object to caravans because of experiences when the owners presumably thought they were sufficiently tied down I suspect they'd take a lot of convincing.

Pity caravans tend to have the doors in the sides - I did wonder about pushing a caravan inside a container. Still, once you've got a container or two on site and permission to live there it's hard to see the advantage of living in a caravan rather than something a tad larger, better insulated and more secure constructed inside a container.

Posted By: skyewrightBeing a refurb however does at least mean that potable water is available on tap and there are 'facilities' (albeit very basic, and a 30m walk from the shed).

I eventually want to do complete rainwater harvesting but there is mains water to very near the site (put in for cattle but then use discontinued for cost reasons) so I plan to use that for a while. There's no mains electricity or telephone, though. I'd plan to correct the second fairly quickly.

That's one of the legal aspects I wondered about though. The site currently has PPIP (planning permission in principle) so I wondered if it would be plausible to get permission for temporary occupation and also for installation of the sceptic tank or if the planners would see that as somehow prejudicial to the eventual full permission, or something.

I had longish chat with the planning lady a few weeks ago. Obviously she couldn't give permission based on the rough sketches I showed her but the indications were that the problems would be matters of detail rather than with my overall ideas. However, the way she spoke seemed to me to indicate that working out those details could be a bit of an iterative process (e.g., she wouldn't give any guidance on what might be suitable for the finish to the gable ends - it's up to me to guess and then they'd express an opinion). I'm fairly confident that I can get permission for a house suitable for my purposes, eventually, but not so confident that it'll be a straightforward process.

Posted By: Ed Davies

If I can avoid it I'd rather not rent a new place on Orkney - I've already sent enough money down the drain renting.

Any thoughts on the legal and practical aspects of this idea?

If you have the money "in hand" as it were to do the build, then I don't think I would hesitate to recommend renting for what should be a relatively short build (speaking as one building just now and living in a caravan on an island). Shipping containers are expensive if they are in decent nick, and not particularly easy or cheap to convert and realistically I'm not sure that many of the bits would be easily recycled into the new build. £6k for two good shipping containers, maybe £2k to insulate/windows&doors/bathroom/kitchen areas - lot of money compared to £4-5k rent for a year till you get house habitable and more importantly effort kind of wasted. Energy that could have gone into getting founds in etc. If you are single then be a lodger and buy a container for your stuff/working in and spend you spare time working there.

Not sure I would worry unduly about planning if the residence is really only temporary and the planners are aware that it for the duration of the build only. Building warrant can be staged if necessary to remain legal in the caravan, just do the first part of the building warrant for the connection to septic/sewer which is all BC will worry about for it - approval very quickly.

If you do the caravan then be aware every caravan I have seen destroyed in high winds has lost its roof. Yes secure the chassis but steps must be taken to secure the roof as well. Old static caravans in >50mph winds are scary and >70mph winds terrifying.

....'' installation of the sceptic tank''. Oh, please, please can I have one of those? And perhaps a sinecure, too?

Posted By: Nick Parsons....'' installation of the sceptic tank''. Oh, please, please can I have one of those? And perhaps a sinecure, too

I thought about the difference between those two words and must have “corrected” myself once too often as I typed it. I wonder though, is a sceptic tank one for storing sceptics in or an armoured fighting vehicle used by sceptics?

Posted By: Ed Davies
Also, I'm very keen to avoid time pressure as that's (in my limited experience of watching other people build) the way to get panicked into spending more money than you first thought (cue Kevin Macloud's little speech just before the second advert break).

I know where you are coming from but there will always be the time pressures, you are working in an area where you don't have a lot of choice of when to build - depending on what build method to an extent as well but in general you need to be wind and water tight quickly to stop building fabric damage from wind and rain and if you are wind and water tight you are as well getting the basics done so you can move in - doesn't need to be fancy, just enough to get a habitation certificate. Time and energy not to mention money that the container solution swallows.... if the money isn't there, then yes it has to be done bit by bit and temporary accommodation is necessary, but if the money is, good planning and get the basics done in a short time frame then move in would be my preferred method.

..but this is Orkney Ed's contemplating - Land's End does not compare. The trees may be wind-blown and stunted in coastal Cornwall, but they do maintain a toe-hold - in Orkney they're aberrations!

Shipping container could be a death trap in a fire. Would certainly need modifications as you can't shut the door from inside, nor get out if someone shuts you in while stealing your copper pipe :-) If modified you might have problem selling it afterwards?

I think parking a portacabin or regular caravan in the lee of the storage container is the way to go. Could rope/fix them together.

I believe in England at least workers are allowed to live in a van onsite but obviously children can't be workers.

Sadly the links on here no longer work but..

http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/forum114/comments.php?DiscussionID=2757

CW, surely one could fold the doors back so they are against the sides - with even a tack-weld, perhaps - and insert a home-made-SIPS front panel and door assembly. Remove the latter and break the weld at the end and Robert is your mother's sibling.

I'd put two of them on site, placed open end to open end (fixing the doors back against the sides, leaving a gap between them into which I would build a "vestibule" with a door one side and a window the other.

Make the middle bit equal in length to the space taken by one of the container doors if swung across the outside of the vestibule so that it can be swung across that side to protect it in the event of a particulary nasty gale.

Do I need to go into more detail or is that enough to get you started on working out the details?

(And chemical toilets are good for a couple of days even for a family of four. Bury the contents in the area you intend to establish your garden. I did that for almost three years without a problem.)

Ed
I would find out about the septic tank as soon as possible, if the percolation test fails then you need some other kind of treatment system other than an ordinary septic tank and obviously added costs.
We built a large work shop on site first and were able to connect the electric to it then our own sparky was able to connect the house from there when it suited us. The water pipe was layed into a stand pipe and we also connected this to the house when it suited. The only problem was the phone, pay for connection to caravan then pay for new connection to house, may be should have fought a bit harder on that one.
We went to the council with some sketches we did but in the end just had to take a punt on the planning. Timber frame ,timber clad and profile steel sheet roof and it went through without a problem, much to our surprise. There is some word of them wanting people to build long narrow houses up here now but I think you would be hard pushed to call that traditional after the last 30 odd years of thier planning policy.