using remote files with local programs

[Kamaraju S Kusumanchi <kamaraju@bluebottle.com>]

Let's say I have two machines.

machine_local
machine_remote

machine_local is under my control (say my personal desktop). I have root
access to it (say root_local) and can pretty much do whatever I want on it.
It currently runs Debian. Let's say the user name on machine_local is
user_local.

machine_remote has huge hard drive space, contains user account user_remote. 
However the problem is that machine_remote is maintained by some other
person (say root_remote) who is reluctant to install new software, provide
nfs access etc., Moreover, machine_remote is not running Debian but some
other Linux distribution (say Redhat 8).

My question is that 

    Without bothering root_remote and just using the ssh account
(user_remote) on machine_remote, would it be possible to use/mount those
files onto machine_local as if they were local files?

The advantage is that, I can run latest and greatest software on
machine_local and at the same time take advantage of facilities like huge
hard drive space, frequent backups etc., on machine_root.

Please note that running NFS server on machine_root is not an option, since
it would involve bothering root_remote for granting access to
machine_local.

Any other ideas/suggestions?

thanks
raju

-- 
Kamaraju S Kusumanchi
http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/kk288/
http://malayamaarutham.blogspot.com/