They began by tearing out the old wall.  this was very labour intensive because, as you can see in the photos above, my neighbour's deck is only about 10 feet from the wall.  They took out a big chunk out of my front yard to pour new footings.

During Photos

Taking Away the Forms and Backfilling

 

After Photos (October 25)

Six weeks latter, we now have a new, straight retaining wall and we are much poorer.