Front Boundary Wall - Planting?

Hi All

Am in the middle of a new build and am a bit confused about the conditions for the front boundary wall. Our planning permission states:

"The front boundary wall should be recessed behind the lines of visibility and shall be re-constructed as a sod-and-stone bank with a minimum height of 1.5 metres, planned to the rear with native hedging and trees"

Further down it states:

"The area between the new road boundary and the public carriageway shall be finished 200-300 mm above carriageway level and finished in grass with these works being designed and constructed in such a manner as to ensure the existing road drainage system is not adversely affected."

My main queries are:

• what is a sod and stone bank
• can we plant on top of it or if not isn't it going to be full of weeds
• finally the grass that we have to plant to the road side - can't see this lasting - it will only take one herd of cows to wreck it or even a car

Would be interested to see how others have tackled this one. Thanks.

Hi,
Our conditions stated we would need to construct a dry stone wall (all 60metres), oboviously the cost would run into 15k +, so we rang the council and they stated that only if we were building a wall then it had to be dry stone. Otherwise a post or rail etc would do

In your case it seems they want to to leave the hedge?
If so you can take out the hedge, and replace with raised scrubs etc.

Hi Bertson - apologies for not being clear - the original front boundary is gone due to sight lines and these are the conditions of our planning permission of what we have to put there instead. At the moment the building had put a big mound of clay as near to 1.5 m as possible. 1.5m is very high so the mound has ended up very wide at the bottom to support such a height.

It seems clear they want a ditch ( sod and stone , IMO your bank will pass) and a grassy margin beside the road , unless you intend to mow the margin ( and you know the issues with cattle and lorries wrecking it ) get grass seed at an Agri CoOp . As you have effectively moved back the old ditch , you can plant ( to the back of ) the top ridge.
Remember that even if you make a total mess , it will be very much in keeping with the country side .
If you are into it , a wild flower mix beside the road ( at Lidl last week) and some sceachs with simple rampling/climing roses , wild hunnysuckle would look great .
pjq