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Yeah, I like the space - There's lots of potential, the garden also extends behind the 2 garages to the left, but wouldn't get masses of light, so I'm thinking further storage/BBQ area. Unfortunately this became a dumping ground for the past 20 years it seems and is work in progress to clear.
The garage - Yeah we'll be keeping it as it's storing a LOT of our crap. It's had a hard life after intensive ivy growth and a lack of maintenance. That was hard work to remove. As you noted, I need to repair the wall a little and think about replacing the asbestos roof...
@Andyp My partner and I have agreed on raised beds, at least around the back and right-hand edges, so that we can lay something down for access to the side-garage door. Your thoughts on mitigating flash-flooding are a good idea and an another reason to go with a lawn, as well as for the kids.
Ballpark ££ for digging up the tarmac/concrete?
pifko-
A bit of googling recommended digging a test hole to see what's underneath - if the tarmac was laid over lots of hardcore, it may be a pain to remove all the hardcore too. Also, it's ambiguous if asphalt requires special disposal or not. I'd start ringing around.
At least it looks like you can get a small digger back there so it might be quick to do.
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Artificial grass drains very well. We dug up our lawn, which was regularly muddy and waterlogged, and replaced it with 50mm of compacted stone dust and some Namgrass on top. Now it drains perfectly and went through all the ridiculous thunderstorms in June with no trouble at all. You could lay it on top of the concrete, with a shockpad underneath, but that wouldn't help with the drainage. If you remove the concrete you wouldn't have to remove the hardcore underneath, just level it up with MOT Type 1 and compact, then 50mm of compacted stone dust (type 1 dust/grano dust) and put the artificial grass on top.
Aroogah
ffm
If you want to grow anything then the tarmac has to go. The raw space has good potential though.
Are you keeping that shed/garage/thing with the large hole near the roofline?