Alltogether Plans The Gables

Building a home at The Gables should be exciting, not an exercise in chasing consultants. Yet that’s how it often goes: one engineer for the stormwater plan, another for the driveway levels, someone else for the retaining wall, a separate report for erosion controls — each working from slightly different information, each with their own timeline, and you in the middle forwarding emails. Alltogether Plans is Contrive Consultants’ answer for lot owners and builders at The Gables: the engineering plans your approval needs, prepared together, by one local team, as one coordinated package.

We’re civil and stormwater engineers based in Rouse Hill — minutes from The Gables — and new-release residential lots in the Hills district are our home ground. We know the shape of this country: the slopes, the clay, the estate-scale drainage systems that individual lots must connect into, and the documentation that certifiers and Hills Shire Council expect to see. Alltogether Plans packages that knowledge into a single, fixed-scope engineering service, so your build starts on time and your certifier gets a set of plans that agree with each other.

Why home builds at The Gables need engineering plans

Whether your new home is approved through a complying development certificate (CDC) with a private certifier or a development application with council, the approval will call for engineering documentation alongside the architectural drawings. Exactly what’s required depends on your lot and your approval pathway, but for new homes on estate lots it commonly includes a stormwater drainage plan showing how roof and surface water reaches the legal discharge point, driveway design where levels or gradients are tight, erosion and sediment control plans for the construction period, and structural design for any retaining walls the site levels demand.

On sloping lots — and The Gables has plenty — these plans are not independent. The driveway grade affects the garage level; the garage level affects the cut and fill; the cut and fill decides whether you need a retaining wall; and the wall changes how the stormwater must run. When each document is produced by a different consultant from a different survey, the inconsistencies surface at certification or, worse, on site. The premise of Alltogether Plans is simple: these plans should be designed together because on your lot they work together.

What we deliver

Stormwater drainage plans — roof and surface drainage designed to the legal point of discharge for your lot, including on-site detention where your lot’s controls require it
Driveway and site level design — gradients, transitions and finished levels checked against the standards your certifier assesses
Retaining wall design — structural documentation for walls arising from your site’s cut and fill, coordinated with the drainage design
Erosion and sediment control plans for the construction phase
Site regrading and earthworks plans where the slab design or landscape design needs them
A single coordinated issue — every drawing produced from the same survey, the same levels and the same design decisions
Certifier and council support — responses to questions on the engineering documentation through to approval

Software & standards

Alltogether Plans documentation is produced in AutoCAD and Civil 3D from your lot’s survey, with stormwater systems designed using DRAINS where detention or piped network analysis is required. Drainage design follows AS/NZS 3500.3 and the requirements applying to your lot and approval pathway; driveway gradients and vehicle access are checked against the AS 2890 series; retaining walls are designed to AS 4678 and the relevant structural codes. Where your lot is subject to estate design guidelines or lot-specific controls, we design to those documents as they apply to your parcel — and we tell you plainly what they mean for your build.

Our process

Lot review and quote. Send us your lot number, contract survey and architectural plans. We review what your approval pathway will actually require and give you a fixed quote for exactly those plans — nothing you don’t need.
Design kick-off. We confirm levels, discharge points and any lot-specific requirements, and lock in the key decisions — garage level, driveway grade, wall locations — with you and your builder before drafting.
Coordinated design. Stormwater, driveway, earthworks and any retaining walls are designed together by the same engineers, from the same model of your lot.
One package, issued once. You receive the complete engineering set, consistent across every sheet, ready for your certifier or council lodgement.
Support to approval and beyond. We answer certifier queries, and if your builder strikes something unexpected on site, you already have an engineer who knows your lot.

Why Contrive

Local to the Gables, literally. Our Rouse Hill office is a short drive from the estate; site visits are easy, and Hills-district ground conditions are our daily work.
One package, one accountable team. No gaps between consultants and no contradictory drawings — if it’s in the engineering set, it was designed to work with everything else in the set.
A full group behind the plans. Where your project needs more than civil engineering, the Contrive group connects you to ARQI for architectural design, NathersPRO for thermal assessments, URBA for planning advice and Sweptpaths for vehicle access analysis — coordinated through one point of contact.
Builder-friendly documentation. Our drawings are drawn to be built from: dimensions where the excavator operator needs them, levels the concreter can set out, and no ambiguity left for site interpretation.

Building in The Gables and still choosing a builder? 13 Homes builds throughout the estate and coordinates closely with our engineering team.

Frequently asked questions

What exactly is Alltogether Plans?

It’s the name for Contrive Consultants’ bundled engineering documentation service for residential lots at The Gables. Rather than engaging separate consultants for stormwater, driveway, retaining wall and erosion control documentation, you engage us once and receive the engineering plans your approval requires as a single coordinated package, designed together by one team.

I don’t know which plans my lot needs. Where do I start?

Start with what you have: your lot details, contract or detail survey, and your house plans if they exist. We’ll review them against your intended approval pathway and come back with a plain-English list of what’s required for your lot, what isn’t, and a fixed quote. There’s no obligation at that stage — many owners simply want to understand the scope before their builder asks for it.

Can my builder or drafter deal with you directly?

Absolutely, and it often works best that way. We’re comfortable being engaged by the owner and coordinating with the builder, or vice versa. Either way, the key design decisions — garage levels, driveway grades, wall heights — are confirmed with whoever is responsible for the build before we document, so there are no surprises at slab stage.

My lot slopes. Does that mean the engineering will blow out?

Slope adds scope — usually a retaining wall or two and more careful driveway design — but it doesn’t have to add chaos. Because we design the levels, walls and drainage as one exercise, we can often reduce wall heights or eliminate a wall entirely by adjusting grades early. That kind of saving is only available when the plans are coordinated from the start, which is the whole point of the service.

Related services

Building at The Gables? Get every engineering plan you need from one local team. Call Contrive Consultants on +61 497 848 111, email info@contriveconsultants.com.au or send us your lot details via our contact page for a fixed quote on your Alltogether Plans package.