Front yard redesign

Although I love our house and the area around us, there is one thing about it that I really want to change--the front yard. We're located on a somewhat busy road and on a corner lot with our driveway practically in front of the living room window. So even though we have huge trees (including a giant Arbutus--see photo) in front of our house, the view is of cars and roads and there's no privacy whatsoever. You can see what I mean in this snapshot.


After living with this for over two years and going back and forth with ideas of what might improve things, we've decided to consult a garden designer to see what might be possible.

One idea is to actually move the driveway so that we can come in and out of the side street. Last week we trotted down to the Saanich Municipal Hall to see if this would be allowed--and it seems that it may be possible. In fact it turns out that our existing driveway is "not to code" being too close to the corner and we may be able to get a permit from the municipality to move it. This morning I met with the designer and it's really exciting to think that we may be able with plantings and berms to take our front yard back from the street. Of course it will probably be hideously expensive but if we do some of the work ourselves.... Oh I'm getting ahead of myself. There's all the permits and measuring and costing and planning to do first. But even the hope that we might have a usable front yard is beyond thrilling at this point.