Tag: construction

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Cottage Life

11 courses to teach you how to build and renovate a cottage

Photo by Monkey Business Images/Shutterstock

For the adventurous DIYers out there, have you considered embarking on your own cottage-building journey? Not only will you avoid the headaches of the housing market, but you’ll also have the freedom to customize your home away from home any way you please. We’ve rounded up 11 online and in-person courses to teach you how to build and renovate a cottage. 

From floor-to-ceiling windows to an entertaining-sized kitchen or even a secret hideaway, you can bring your wildest architectural dreams to life. And let’s not forget the added bonus of being able to build a cottage that’s eco-friendly and up-to-date with all the latest codes.

If you’re feeling intimidated by the thought of constructing a cottage from scratch, fear not. There are cottage- and home-building courses offered in-person and online. They’ll teach you how to build a strong foundation, plus everything you need to know about framing, constructing a roof, and installing doors and windows.

Home and Cottage: Construction, TDSB 

In-person

Ready to get your hands dirty and learn how to build your dream cottage? The Toronto District School Board has you covered with exciting in-person construction courses. Get ready to roll up those sleeves and dive deep into building codes, permits, foundation building, and waterproofing. Plus, they will cover the basics of framing floors, walls, roofs, and trusses. 

Sign up for the nine-week course every Tuesday from April 4 to May 30 or every Wednesday from April 5 to May 31. Classes run from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. The sign-up deadline is April 12 and April 13, respectively. The total cost, including materials, is $261.

DIY University

Online

Calling all DIY enthusiasts: don’t miss out on becoming the ultimate handyperson and master the art of construction through a variety of free and paid classes. Choose from topics like building a tiny house, adding electrical outlets, or kitchen storage, plus learning basic skills for laying concrete or drywall. 

With 162 instructor-led, on-demand, or skills workshops, there is something for everyone’s future or current cottage. Plus, they offer course bundles for bathroom remodelling, new homeownership, and outliving.

Building Industry Workshop: House Construction, buildABILITY 

Online and in-person

Time to get started on your new cottage build by joining buildABILITY for two half-days of workshops where you’ll learn the fundamentals of building a home.

Whether you prefer online or in-person learning, buildABILITY has it all. This online database covers everything from house construction to roof framing. By the end of the course, you’ll be equipped with all the construction terms, understand the construction process, know how to work with municipalities on the development process, explore fire and sound control methods, and learn how to finish the interior and exterior.

You can also check out the other options, such as the science of building better basements or construction technology and building science. 

The virtual class is $349 and takes place on April 5 and 12 from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. In-person classes will resume in spring 2023. Check the website for details.

Wild Abundance’s Carpentry, Tiny House, and Home Building Workshops

In-person

Wild Abundance offers a variety of classes on a rolling basis, so there is always something new to learn. Right now, they offer in-person women’s-only and all-gender courses to ensure everybody feels welcome in the building and construction space. 

You can sign up for basic or advanced carpentry, how to build environmentally-friendly tiny houses, and timber framing classes. Plus, you can join their tiny house academy online. 

Find all the dates online. The best part? They offer a sliding scale pricing system, where you pay what you can afford. 

UnBEATable’s Comprehensive Log Building Course

In-person

Looking to build a cottage oryour dream log cabin but don’t know where to start? Look no further than UnBEATable’s three-week, 120-hour course that will teach you how to build a log shell from start to finish. 

From Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., you’ll learn how to work with tools, select the logs, build the shell, and read site plans. Also, UnBEATable provides a list of required tools and equipment on their website so you can come fully prepared.

The course starts on April 17 and costs $3,750, plus GST. If you’re interested in learning about roof systems, there’s a course starting on May 8 that costs $1,200, plus GST. 

Passive House Design and Construction Training

Online

Get ready to build a cottage that’s energy-efficient and cost-effective by joining the Canadian Passive House Institute. The online course is jam-packed with 13 modules and over 90 training videos to teach construction techniques, building science, and economical ways to save money.  

Complete the course full-time in six days or follow at your own pace. The cost of the course is $499. Looking to be certified? Add on the PHPP Introduction course and the CPHD Prep Course. 

The Pat Wolfe Log Building School

In-person

Roll up those sleeves because the Pat Wolfe Log Building School offers a one-of-a-kind learning experience to prepare you to build your own log cabin. In-person classes start in the spring and fall, with one-, four-, and ten-week options. 

The one-week course is a great introduction to log building, while the four-week course is perfect for owner-builders. The ten-week course is designed for own-builders who also want to pursue a career in the industry. 

Spring courses are available from April 17 to June 23, and fees range from $750 to $4,000, depending on the duration. Fall courses start on September 11 and end on November 17. Register using the online form. 

Tiny House Workshops

Online and in-person

Learn how to build a cottage that’s small and cozy from expert Kenton Zerbin, who has been building DIY tiny homes since 2010. All Canadians can access this specialized training with convenient locations in Toronto, Montreal, Edmonton, Lethbridge, and Ottawa. 

Join this in-person two-and-a-half-day workshop for $499 (dates to be announced soon), or get instant access to the online workshop covering the same topics for $349. Both courses will discuss design, utilities and legalities, and construction—everything you need to build your own tiny home from scratch. 

Home Depot DIY Workshops

In-person

Shop and learn in the same place with Home Depot’s free in-person workshops for adults and children. There aren’t any adult classes running at the moment, but new seminars are released on a rolling basis and vary from store to store. 

Tip: new children’s classes happen on the second Saturday of each month. 

The York Academy 

In-person

Looking to become a construction pro? Then get ready to put in some work with the York Academy. Learn different construction and home renovation techniques during their training courses starting on April 3 for full-time students (running Monday to Thursday, 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.) or on April 22 for part-time students (running Saturday to Sunday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.).

These programs are perfect for individuals looking to gain practical experience in work site conditions, blueprints, foundation building, carpentry, dry walling, flooring, basic electrical, and basic plumbing. With this training, you’ll have your dream cottage up and running in no time. 

Udemy New Home Construction Program 

Online

Don’t have much time to spare? No problem. Udemy has a virtual on-demand series of eight courses. Prepare to build your own cottage by learning different build styles, building lingo, design criteria, and building codes.

The best part is you can access the course anytime and from anywhere. Each class costs $27.99, with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Build it, fix it, get it done!

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Categories
Cottage Life

What the U.S. tariff reduction on Canadian softwood lumber means for you

Photo by Shutterstock/AS-kom

On August 4, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced that it would be cutting the tariff on most Canadian softwood lumber imports from 17.91 per cent to 8.59 per cent. The new rate is expected to take effect later this month.

This is just one act in a long-time lumber dispute that’s been ongoing between the two countries since the late 1800s. The Trump administration introduced the most recent tariff in 2017, claiming that the Canadian government subsidized its forest industry, allowing Canadian lumber companies to flood the U.S. market with cheaper wood and outprice U.S. competitors.

Most Canadian logging forests exist on Crown land and forestry companies are required to pay a “stumpage fee” to provincial governments for the right to log. In the U.S., however, logging forests are largely owned by lumber companies. In the past, U.S. lumber companies have complained that Canada’s provincial governments charge low stumpage fees for cutting trees, allowing Canadian lumber companies to produce cheaper wood.

By lowering the lumber tariff to 8.59 per cent, the current U.S. government is making it cheaper for Canadian companies to export lumber. In turn, this should lower prices, making it more affordable for U.S. home and cottage owners in need of building materials.

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), a U.S. organization that advocates for more housing opportunities, estimates that since spring 2020, extreme price swings in lumber, in part due to tariffs, have added an average of $14,300 (USD) to the price of a new home.

But despite the lumber tariff being cut in half, the Canadian government is still unhappy with the trade agreement. “Canada is disappointed that the United States continues to impose unwarranted and unfair duties on Canadian softwood lumber. While the duty rates will decrease from the current levels for the majority of exporters, the only truly fair outcome would be for the United States to cease applying baseless duties to Canadian softwood lumber,” said Mary Ng, Canada’s Minister of International Trade, Export Promotion, Small Business, and Economic Development, in a statement.

Canada intends to challenge the tariff by launching a dispute settlement process under Chapter 10 of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).

Even if Canada is able to convince the U.S. to drop the tariff, constraints on lumber supply could cause prices to remain high. “While [Canadian] producers might like to produce more lumber for the market, the reality is we’re probably going to continue shutting more sawmills down in the next five to 10 years because we just simply don’t have enough supply of logs to feed those mills,” said Gary Bull, a forest resources management professor at the University of British Columbia.

For over a decade now, Canada’s logging forests have been contending with what experts call natural disturbance. These are large-scale events, such as forest fires and invasive insects, that destroy trees. “We’ve had over 30 million acres of trees eaten alive by insects,” Bull said.

As a result of the destroyed trees, logging companies are grappling with what’s called the mid-term timber supply problem. “We’ve planted billions of trees, but when that happens, we have to wait for these things to grow for three or four decades before we can make sawn timber again,” Bull said.

Compared to tariffs, lack of supply has a much greater impact on the amount of lumber making it into the U.S. market, Bull said.

It also impacts Canadian consumers. Low supply keeps lumber prices high, making it more expensive for cottagers looking to renovate or build. In the past, when supply was low, the Canadian government would import lumber from Russia, but considering recent global events, that seems unlikely, Bull said.

“When I’m thinking about cottagers and building, my view is that lumber prices are not going to go down ever to the price levels that they were,” Bull said. “Therefore, if you’re going to build, build well, and build to last.”

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Cottage Life

Cottage Q&A: Revoking a right-of-way

By Peter Turner Photography/Shutterstock

There is a right-of-way through my property that dates back to horse and buggy days. Traffic has obviously increased; it is now being used by heavy construction equipment to build and remodel cottages beyond our property. Is this legal? Can it be stopped? Can an old RoW be revoked because of a substantial change in use?—Jan Le Clair, Sand Lake, Ont.

Ian Keay, a managing partner with MKC Law Office in Peterborough, Ont., is answering your questions with…more questions. “Does the party using the right-of-way have that right in their deed? If the answer is no, then, does the party using the right-of-way have a prescriptive right-of-way?” (That’s when the easement is created after a party uses the road for a certain number of years, giving them a form of “adverse possession”—a.k.a. squatter’s rights—that legally allows them to use the road.)  

If those using the right-of-way don’t have that right in their deed, you could apply for an injunction (a judge’s order) to keep the construction equipment off your property, says Keay. “But the party doing the construction may be able to establish a prescriptive right-of-way, which could defeat the injunction.” 

Okay, back to square one. It’s true that the construction equipment might exceed “what was contemplated when the original right-of-way was granted,” says Keay. Or, the disruption could amount to “substantial interference,” considered offensive, inconvenient, or annoying to a “reasonable person.” 

The former does happen. For example, a right-of-way established only so that a farmer can lead cattle to the edge of a lake to drink, or a right-of-way to only access parking. Unfortunately, “most often with ‘old’ rights-of-way, there are no restrictions or specifications whatsoever,” says Keay. “And I doubt the usage amounts to substantial interference.” (Yes, apparently, there is equipment that is more annoying than construction equipment.)

Even if it does, Keay doesn’t think that the right-of-way would be revoked. “It’s more likely that the continued use of the road by the heavy equipment could be restricted or prevented. Only a judge can do this.”

So, you might not be able to stop all traffic on the easement, but if it keeps the noisy equipment off your property, that’s a win, isn’t it? Contact a lawyer with a strong background in easements, and go from there.

Got a question for Cottage Q&A? Send it to answers@cottagelife.com.

This article was originally published in the May 2022 issue of Cottage Life magazine.

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Boston Dynamics’ robodog ‘Spot’ joins Toronto construction team

Construction companies PCL and Pomerleau Construction are teaming up with Intel, Microsoft and internet-of-thing (IoT) company Latium to bring innovation to construction in Canada. To start, the two construction companies and three tech companies brought Boston Dynamics’ ‘Spot’ robot dog to Cadillac Fairview’s 160 Front Street project in Toronto.

Spot first appeared on a Pomerlau site in Montreal back in 2019, and now PCL will send it to a couple of job sites to further study how Spot can help improve workflows.

While on job sites, Spot will sport several add-on technologies, all of which feed data into Latium’s ‘Job Site Insights’ smart construction platform. For example, Spot will have 360-degree cameras, a Leica RTC360 laser scanner, Latium’s environmental air quality sensors, GPS sensors and more.

Additionally, Latium enabled Spot’s data to be aggregated and displayed “on a single pane of glass,” which appears to mean tablets judging by the below video. That allows job site personnel to view real-time information and quickly respond to changing job site conditions and events. There’s a strong safety aspect too, with Spot able to get into dangerous or hard-to-reach spaces.

The Spot tests could lead construction companies to invest in robotics and other technology to help modernize job sites, improve worker safety and more.

Previously, Spot was deployed to monitor factories in South Korea and also saw a stint in the French army.

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Potins

Jennifer Connelly in roof dispute

Jennifer Connelly is being sued for allowing her roof to ”fall into disrepair”.

The 43-year-old actress’ New York loft apartment suffered extensive damage costing $262,000 following a big rainstorm in October 2010 and her insurance company have filed a claim against the construction company who worked on the roof in the 1860s former warehouse building.

However, according to TMZ, the roofers have filed a counter-claim in which they insist the problems were the actress’ fault as she had allowed it to fall into disrepair and if a jury orders them to pay the insurance company, they want a judge to make Jennifer – who raises sons Kai, 17, and Stellan, 13, and daughter Agnes, three, with husband Paul Bettany – pay them back.

Despite the legal dispute, the ‘Noah’ actress insists it is nothing to do with her.

She told the New York Post newspaper’s Page Six column: ”It’s not correct. There’s no story, there’s no lawsuit. It’s misinformation.”

Her spokesperson added: ”[The actress] put a claim on [her] insurance, and the roof was fixed, and that was that. She had nothing to do with the lawsuit.”

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Nouvelles quotidiennes

Bali places moratorium on new hotel construction

In order to preserve the extraordinary landscape of Bali, authorities have decided to limit the construction of new hotels, and are more likely to favour quality over quantity in the future.

The Indonesian island paradise of Bali, which has been experiencing a surge in tourism, saw its uniqueness undermined by the proliferation of new buildings needed to accommodate its burgeoning tourist trade.

The governor of the island has placed a moratorium on all hotel construction in the three main tourist areas in order to assess the situation and take the time to analyze all the issues.

Given the popularity of the island with tourists, it is now not uncommon to see traffic jams on the roads linking the resorts of Kuta, Sanur, Nusa Dua and Ubud.

Over 2 million tourists visited the Indonesian island in 2010, and more than 2.5 million are expected to visit this year.