Fence Repair Marin
Fence Repair Marin
Larkspur is a canyon town with a flat edge, and the two halves need different work. Madrone Canyon alone is roughly three hundred and seventy five homes on Madrone Avenue and the streets running off it, sitting under redwoods with Larkspur Creek along the south side, and it has been a certified Firewise neighborhood since 2019. Fences in there stand in deep shade on ground that never fully dries.
Out toward Greenbrae the lots open up, the sun gets in, and the failure pattern flips from rot to weathering and post movement in heavier soil. Same town, different repair.
The canyon side also brings up fire in a way the flats do not. A wood fence running straight into the wall of a house is a path for embers, and the direction California is heading is a noncombustible break in the last five feet where a fence meets a structure. We will build that detail whether or not anyone is requiring it of you yet, because it is cheap while the run is already open and expensive to retrofit later. Call today for a free estimate on fence repair, fence replacement, or deck repair in Larkspur.
Before anything gets built it is worth knowing what Larkspur allows, because the canyon lots and the flats are treated the same way by the code even though they are nothing alike as a job. Larkspur's own code sets it at six feet for a rear or interior side yard, and three and a half feet for a front yard or street-facing side yard, tighter than the six-foot number a lot of people assume applies everywhere in Marin. Near a corner, that drops further, nothing over thirty inches within thirty feet of the intersection, so sight lines stay clear. Going taller than the by-right limit means applying for a fence height exception through the town rather than an argument with the inspector afterward. Height is measured from existing grade, so building the ground up under a fence to gain height does not work. We check the current rule with the town for your specific address before drawing anything, since these get amended and a fence built to last year's number is still built wrong. Next door in Corte Madera the numbers are close but not identical.
Madrone Canyon decks live under constant organic debris, and that dictates how they should be built and maintained. Needles and leaf litter pack into the gaps between deck boards, hold moisture there, and start rot in the joints. So gapping matters. Boards set too tight look better the week they go down and trap everything afterward, and a slightly wider gap that lets debris fall through is worth more than any sealer. Underneath, we would rather see joists with a protective membrane along the top edge, which is a strip that keeps water off the one surface where deck boards trap it against the framing. It costs very little during a build and adds years. Cleaning the gaps out twice a year is the maintenance nobody does and everybody should. Given the Firewise context in the canyon, what accumulates under a deck matters for more than rot, and keeping that space clear is worth doing for both reasons. For a build in these conditions, deck installation done with the drainage details right is the whole game.