Thanks for anyone who may be able to help. We're struggling with designs for our 1st new pool .
-14 x 38 foot (L-shaped), 22-25,000 gallons.
-115 ft perimeter
-570-585 square feet pool
-3 ft to 7 ft deep
-950 sq ft of decking
Our house sits on a hill and we have a terraced backyard. There is a large curved retaining wall (at least 10 feet high) in the upper level backyard where the pool will go. The house and retaining wall were built 4 years ago and the survey says that it's Criblock. That wall seems very well built and we've had no problems with it all.
In an effort to keep costs down, our prospective pool builders have all suggested keeping the retaining wall in place, rather than knocking it down and rebuilding a new one for the pool. This will make our pool narrower, but we're OK with that. All the designs will have an 50' x 18" exposed beam along the back of the pool, due to a very slight slope in the backyard.
My question is regarding the distance from the back of the pool to this pre-existing retaining wall. Some PB have designs as close to 3 feet from the wall, while others have said that we should keep it to 4 or 4.5 feet at a minimum. The PB with the closer distance said that the pool will not affect the integrity of the retaining wall. However, I'm hearing conflicting things from the other PBs, who said that we shouldn't build that close.
This is all very confusing to me, and I want to make the right decision. Obviously, the closer we can get to the wall, the larger I can make the pool which is great. But I don't want to risk a problem in the future.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
-14 x 38 foot (L-shaped), 22-25,000 gallons.
-115 ft perimeter
-570-585 square feet pool
-3 ft to 7 ft deep
-950 sq ft of decking
Our house sits on a hill and we have a terraced backyard. There is a large curved retaining wall (at least 10 feet high) in the upper level backyard where the pool will go. The house and retaining wall were built 4 years ago and the survey says that it's Criblock. That wall seems very well built and we've had no problems with it all.
In an effort to keep costs down, our prospective pool builders have all suggested keeping the retaining wall in place, rather than knocking it down and rebuilding a new one for the pool. This will make our pool narrower, but we're OK with that. All the designs will have an 50' x 18" exposed beam along the back of the pool, due to a very slight slope in the backyard.
My question is regarding the distance from the back of the pool to this pre-existing retaining wall. Some PB have designs as close to 3 feet from the wall, while others have said that we should keep it to 4 or 4.5 feet at a minimum. The PB with the closer distance said that the pool will not affect the integrity of the retaining wall. However, I'm hearing conflicting things from the other PBs, who said that we shouldn't build that close.
This is all very confusing to me, and I want to make the right decision. Obviously, the closer we can get to the wall, the larger I can make the pool which is great. But I don't want to risk a problem in the future.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
