Fairfax County
Building Permits
Fairfax County Approved Composites and Plastics (decking & railings):This link will take you to a table of composites and plastics that have been approved by Fairfax County for use on decks and/or porches. If you will be applying for a Building Permit, Fairfax requires you to have two (2) copies of the appropriate report with the Building Permit Application. You can obtain the report by clicking on the link on the right which will download the appropriate report as a PDF file. Print it out and take two (2) copies with you when you apply for the Building Permit. Hint #1: Easier still, download a GeoDeck decking report here... or a Fairway Vinyl railing report here. Take two copies of each one with you for Plan Review. Hint #2: If you are standing at the Building Permit counter at 8:00am on a Monday-Thursday, you should be out in 1 1/2 hours, Permit in hand. Cost is $56. Hint #3: When applying for a homeowner permit, you will go through something called Fairfax Zoning. They require the deck/porch be drawn to scale on an actual House Location Survey (plat). They have recently gotten pretty sticky about this and now require that the House Location Survey have a land surveyer's seal or a engineer's seal (not an architect's seal). They require that it not be a faxed copy and that it be a complete copy showing everything. Got to warn you: One of our guys went to get a permit recently and was turned down because the very bottom of the seal was not visible. They want to see it all. Hint #4: Building the deck yourself? You will want to familiarize yourself with the Fairfax County Typical Deck Details publication (some wonderfully light, night time reading). This is the latest and greatest issue and I actually highly recommend any builder or DIYer homeowner read this carefully from cover to cover.
Fairfax Plan Review: 703 222-0114.
Once in their menu, hit #1, then #3, then #1. |
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