Going Up

The Cheney Cottage from the back, sitting on the beam.

The second floor of the Cheney Cottage is off the dollies, and headed up. Here is the progress from today.

The east side of the Cheney Cottage with the huge beam.

The other interesting view in these pictures is the new colors. Purple for the base, green for the trim and cream on the windows. You can see it best on the pictures of the front of the Cottage.

The Cheney Cottage with the Delaney House behind

The Home Stretch

Monday morning, 6:30AM. The rains have stopped, the sky is clear, and the weather reports are good. This is the week when the second half of the Cheney Cottage moves to 62nd Street.

Starting today, Phil and his crew will be on 62nd Street, preparing for the move. First, they'll put large glulam beams down to stabilize the cribbing, then put the large beams through the second floor to support it. The second floor will be lifted, and the dollies, after being under the second floor for 11 months, will be removed. Phil will take the dollies back to Albany Village, and put them under the first floor.

Then the second floor will be lifted 16 feet up in the air. The beams stick out the east and west side of the second floor, so the entire structure can be raised from the outside (to keep the space under the second floor clear).

Later this week, Phil will pull the first floor of the Cheney Cottage out of the Gill Tract and put it on the parking lot, ready to go. And then on Sunday morning, the first floor will follow the second: Along 8th Street to Gilman, down Gilman to 6th, 6th over to University, up University to Sacramento, then all the way along Sacramento to Alcatraz, up Alcatraz to King and over to 62nd Street.

Once at 62nd Street, the first floor will be unhooked from the truck, and attached to the winch to pull the first floor under the second floor, positioning it exactly on the points Moran Engineering identified as the right spot, based on the plans Andus Brandt drew up.

Eric Angress will then work with his crew to dig and pour the foundation, and build new pony walls to support the first floor. The first floor willy gently be placed on its new foundation, and then the cribbing will be brought inside and built up to support the ceiling. Upstairs, the cribbing will continue up to the suspended second floor, and the beams removed. Then the second floor will be gently lowered down and set on the first floor.

We hope to have the house back in one piece by April 1st.

I'm also meeting Dare Morris this week to get a bid on painting the exterior of the Cheney Cottage. As part of the sale of the house, the University did all the asbestos and lead abatement, so the exterior of the house has been scraped and is ready to be patched and painted. This is a huge advantage: the lead paint removal is costly and difficult, so having the house ready for paint has saved us quite a bit of money.

We've been looking at the old paint left on the house, and have determined that one of the original colors of the house (maybe the first color) was purple, along with green. This is a house that has been grey and undistinguished for years, so we're going back to its roots: we're painting the house a deep purple with dark green trim and cream colored sashes. After all it's been through, we think it's time for the Cheney Cottage to put on some bright colors and show itself off.

Stripping Wallpaper

It is somewhat out of sequence, but I spent a very pleasant afternoon in the three bedrooms and upstairs hallway of the Cheney Cottage, stripping wallpaper.

Of course, all three bedrooms and the hallway have one thing in common: there is no floor. The second floor is still on top the first floor of the Cheney Cottage, still sitting in Albany. Each bedroom consists of the walls and ceiling, and when you look down, you see mud, the wheels of the dollies used to move the house, and the metal and wood beams that are holding the second floor of the Cheney Cottage rigid. In order to stand in the rooms, you have to walk on the beams.

Because of the house's extended stay in Albany, the inside of the second floor is very damp. The plaster is mostly damp, and the wallpaper is coming off in sheets. Since we had planned to strip the wallpaper anyway, I decided to start today. I climbed up and walked on the beams, and stripped wallpaper wherever it was coming off - which was most places. It felt good, like the house was whole again, and like progress was being made.

I also spent some time walking around the outside of the house, pulling nails. This is all easier to do now with the second floor only 3 feet off the ground. This week, Phil and his crew will come back and lift the second floor 16 feet in the air. Then on Sunday, the first floor will be slid underneath it.

So we keep thinking of things we can work on that we will find easier now, with the second floor at ground level, than when it is raised.

The eaves back on the house

The eaves are also complete, and already the house looks like it's coming back to what it was. It has a long way to go, but the work has begun.

Cheney Cottage: The Movie

Pete Alvarez, our wonderful neighbor on 62nd Street, made a 6 minute video of the house move from last Sunday. It's quite wonderful to watch.

We have had one delay: the move of the first floor of the Cheney Cottage will not happen this Sunday, but has been postponed to Sunday, March 6th. So this weekend we'll probably be at 62nd Street, prepping the second floor for paint.

We're hoping the rains go away soon.

And So It Begins

Today we started working on the Cheney Cottage again.

The lot is a sea of mud, and even getting around the house requires leaping from pieces of plywood to old tarps to dry islands. The two houses are sitting there, definitely a work in progress. The Delaney House is on cribbing, a big space under it. The Cheney Cottage's second floor is still sitting on the wheels that brought it to 62nd Street, and those wheels are coated with the mud of the lot.

But the work has to start, and it did. Neil and Reuben came and started putting the eaves back on the west side of the house (the eaves on two sides were removed to make the house fit down the streets as it was moved). To do this, we needed to sort through all the wood we took off the house when it was on campus, and figure out which pieces went on each place. Then all the various pieces of the eaves had to have the nails pulled, so they were ready to be reinstalled.

Neil and Reuben begin the work of rebuilding the eaves

Sabastian came down this weekend, and we enlisted him in this process - along with the two of us. We pulled nails out of dozens of boards, each one having lots and lots of nails. It sounds like grueling work, but actually, it was enjoyable: we all felt great the things were happening, and that the house was finally getting some work done on it.

Sabastian at work pulling nails, under the shelter of the Delaney House

Tom and I both spent a lot of time on the roof. I climbed up and took down the pipes that had been installed on the roof, the ones that let wires slide over it as we went down the streets. Then I pulled off the original tarp, which had been screwed down under the pipes before we left the campus. Tom then climbed up and installed new tarps on the house (the roof is completely shot - no idea when we'll get to fixing it).

We also spent some time climbing around the beams that are currently holding the second floor together, inspecting the plaster and determining how much work needs to be done. There is no floor in the upper section of the house, but by standing on the beams, we can feel like we were back in the bedrooms and the bathrooms on the second floor of the Cheney Cottage.

The place is a wreck: holes in the plaster, damage from the rains, a bullet hole in one of the bedroom windows. All the wiring and plumbing is gone. And, of course, the floor is gone, still sitting in Albany Village on top of the first floor of the house. But just being in there made us feel like the house was coming back. It's on its way back to being habitable.

The Fourth of Five

Phil Joy spent half the day, as Ricky would say, "yanking our Cheney".

Getting ready to leave the Gill Tract, Albany Village

The day started early, after a night of little sleep, with me scraping ice off the windshield of the car. It was cold and very clear, with 3/4 moon shining brightly in the clear, cloudless sky.

We got over to Albany Village at about 6 AM, and the house was sitting there, ready for its journey. We had a few quiet minutes alone with the house, taking some photos, taking some loose trim down, and getting ready for the move.

Then the crew arrived: first Dre, who helps guide the house, then Phil and Celeste and the rest of the crew, driving various trucks and vans and pickups.

After that, things started happening fast. The house was attached to a long bar, which was then attached to the back of the truck. Suddenly, the truck started moving forward, and the house responded, coming off the dirt and onto the blacktop. The house was on the road.

Tom and I both later said that this was the moment when we finally relaxed. Seeing the house start moving made us feel like everything was going to be okay.

Leaving Albany Village

And so it began: we went through Albany Village, then back into Berkeley on 8th Street. We had no trouble with parked cars, and we mostly glided down the streets, down Gilman, down 6th, and onto University.

Heading up University Avenue

We had some problems on University, but moved along at a walking pace for most of the trip. Then we turned south on Sacramento.

Sacramento is a four lane divided street, with lots of trees. The house fit down the street, but in several places we had to navigate through the trees, losing the occasional roof shingle in the process. Only one of the trees had to be trimmed, and Phil used his chainsaw to cut two relatively small branches free.

Avoiding the trees on Sacramento

As I walked in front of the house, I was on the phone with the Berkeley PD. Somehow, despite the fact that we had gotten permits for the move, gotten the Police and Fire Departments to sign off on the move, and called Dispatch the night before to let them know about the move, the Berkeley PD knew nothing about it. Julia had gone on ahead to see how Alcatraz and King Streets looked, and they were clogged with parked cars.

The Police responded incredibly well, assuring me that all the parked cars would be removed by the time we reached Alcatraz. When we finally turned onto Alcatraz, we saw all the cars had been moved: Julia had knocked on doors and told people of the move, the police had blasted their sirens to get neighbors to see what was going on, and only two cars ended up being towed.

We went quickly up Alcatraz, and as we turned onto King Street, we saw the whole street was empty. So we blasted down the last two blocks, and turned onto 62nd Street.

The neighbors were out in full force, everyone happy to see the project moving along and fascinated by the process. The house moved down 62nd and stopped in front of the Delaney House. Then Phil and the crew detached the truck, and attached the Cheney Cottage to the winch, and began to winch the house in to the lot.

Arriving on 62nd Street

At this point, a hook and ladder truck and an ambulance came around the corner of 62nd and Stanford, with the sirens blaring. Of course, no one from Dispatch had notified the Berkeley Fire Department either, so they went around the block, and then pulled up on the other side of the house, two doors down from the house across the street.

A fire truck arrives on 62nd Street

Jon and Emily Mires had brought their sons, Cole and Lane, to see the show, and the boys were in heaven: a house move, a fire truck and an ambulance!

Watching with the Mires family as the house moves onto the lot

Slowly, the house moved back onto the lot. By 12:30, the second floor of the Cheney Cottage was in place on 62nd Street.

The Cheney Cottage is moved in front of the Delaney House

Diane Dew was there and took a slew of wonderful photos - you can see them on Diane's Facebook page.

So we're tired, we walked for miles, and we're happy. The Cheney Cottage is halfway there.

The Second Floor of the Cheney Cottage, now on 62nd Street

4 AM

Two hours to go. We meet Phil Joy in two hours to begin the fourth stage of this odyssey. And of course, I can't sleep - but tonight, even Tom is awake. It feels like the first hill on a roller coaster, the expectation as you hear the clanking of the car being pulled up, knowing that the ride is unstoppable, that soon you'll be moving quickly, your fate in someone else's hands.

There is so much riding on this, and the house has to travel so far. Even though the trip from 2243 College to the Gill Tract was probably more dramatic (particularly the steep hill up to Gayley that started the whole trip, then the long trip down Bancroft with tight squeezes on every block), this feels huge to us. The Cheney Cottage will soon be transversing Berkeley, North to South, from Albany to the Oakland line. We have so much riding on this, and there are so many things that have to go right.

Fortunately, what we mostly have is faith in Phil Joy. We know he can make this happen.

And the moon is shining, the sky is clear. The rains, which haven't let up for a week, are gone.

So, here we go. You have to be this tall to ride the Cheney. No pregnant women or people with heart conditions allowed.