When we purchased this home three years ago one of the things we loved about it was the nice backyard. Even though we are in the city we had a great backyard with lovely old trees and a garden. But what we really liked was the fact that the owner had a brick fire pit in the backyard. She told us at the time how much the neighbours enjoyed coming over and sitting around it on a warm summer’s evening. Sold. Now I was not really happy with the old brick fire pit because I felt that it was unsafe and did not meet the regulations in the city bylaws so I ran out and bought a new chimnea. The very first night we had a small fire someone called the fire department. They showed up and told us it was bothering someone and I had to put my fire out. Fine. I put the half glass of beer on it and out it went (which indicates how big the fire was).
Since then, the regulations have changed and the fire department will no longer come when they are called about this. As long as people are burning clean wood (ours is dry and two years old) and using a proper appliance with proper clearances they will not bother you. Now whenever we have a fire all I hear are secondhand complaints from people about my neighbour. She says that the smoke bothers her asthma. Ironically before we moved in she was one of the people sitting around the fire every night. She even complains about a guy’s fire who lives 10 houses down the street!
We are good neighbours. When it is windy we do not have a fire as we do not want our smoke bothering others. And we have small fires with clean burning wood. No junk or garbage. We do not have loud parties (usually it is just my wife and I and maybe our parents sitting around the fire and we put it out by 11:30pm). All we want is to enjoy our little piece of the wilderness in the city. —Bobby
This article appears in Jun 14-20, 2012.
we were thinking of putting a firepit in our backyard, not anymore
I always thought those chimineas were banned in HRM but a little digging seems to imply otherwise. I must have heard they were banned when I went somewhere on vacation or something.
so there’s nothing they can do about it, really…
save raising up against you in an angry flash-mob
Pretty sure the only time they’re banned is when the municipality or DNR ban all open flames during overly dry weather.
swamp is correct, all i could find was a pdf and the law regarding outdoor fires. if you follow the rules, they appear to be perfectly legal
did you buy the house bobby? if so, you can damn well do what the fuck you want inside it and on the property, as long as it does not violate a code. check up on all the codes and bullshit for your area. then tell the rest to go fuck themselves. have a nice little bbq friend, and to hell with the neighbors.
Bbqs are not viewed as open flame, you could disquise the firepit as a bbq?
she’s probably one of the same lame bitches who complains about the bridge commission ads…there’s a dumb slut over here in the woodlawn/westphal area who does the same thing with the same ridiculous claim…anyone that sensitive needs to be living in a bubble