Private Gravel Road Woes

[Shield Arc]

I live in the same situation with a gravel road:thumbdown:. Neighbor who lives 660-feet from the pavement bought one of these little DR Power Grader. I laughed at it, I thought he threw his money away! Boy was I wrong. I found a good deal on a used one. I have three grandsons who live behind me, now the middle grandson grades the road from their house past mine to the one neighbor about 1,000-feet, and he grades to the pavement. These things are amazing!:cool2:
DR Power Grader (Driveway Grader) | DR Power Equipment

 

[oosik]

What EGON said is very true. A gravel/dirt road is a dynamic thing. It changes seasonally and will require maintenance. Some areas will be good for years - others may require attention two to four or more times a year.

I've got one 100' section of my mile long driveway that I work on at least 3X annually. Water just naturally drains to this area and there is no way around it. At times I've thought of just making a pond and not worry so much about the driveway -:dance1:

 

[Capricious]

Doesn't have to be a "private" gravel road for there to be problems.

10 years ago I bought a parcel of land fronting on a county gravel road- I was specifically trying to avoid any private roads.

Well, I learned that the county does not maintain this road (which wasn't in too bad of shape 10 years ago.)

This is a "dead end" road less than 1/4 mile long, and one other property owner needs to use it for access. I tried to get them to help me convince
the county to take care of the road, but they never responded. When it became clear the county was not going to work on the road, I asked the property
owner if they would contribute to the cost of maintaining it, and never heard back from them. They are absentee owners, and live about 500 miles away.

If I want the road repaired, I will have to do it myself, and the neighbor will benefit. PLUS, the public will benefit. Just because the county does not maintain
the road does not mean it is not a public road. People use the road to access public property. I cannot legally close it off.

That's just the way it is.

 

[radioman]

well -- you mentioned 200 buck fee for 12 houses = 2400 funds available. where is this money going? who is collecting the money and who decides how its spent? are you part of this group? if not its time to be.
While its true, any dirt/gravel road needs maintenance esp. when being used by 12 homes times how many drivers per household - just blindly handing over hoa money without knowing how its spent doesnt sit well with me.

 

[RedNeckRacin]

I hate to say it OP but, it sounds like you are ignorant of road costs(not to be rude). A competent operator can range from $65-$120 per hour depending on the equipment(and not joe schmoe with his tractor). Culverts are on the order of $15/foot and stone around here runs around $525/triaxle load (23 tons-ish). If you think a ton of material goes very far, start figuring out some volumes to lay down a 12' wide road, 4" deep by a few thousand feet. IF that seems expensive, get a quote on paving and that should bring you back to reality. If there is no base to the road and no drainage, its not going to be a cheap fix. You need to do some reading on dirt and gravel road maintenance by the forest service. I know the PA website has a pretty good writeup on it and I also took the class. Control the water or you will never get a handle on it.

For example. .3 milesx5280ft/mile=1584 ft. 1584ftx12ft wide roadx.33ft deep (assuming 4" of stone) =6272.64 ft^3 so we then divide by 27 to get cubic yards. 232.32 yd^3. Now a yard of limestone runs about 3000lbs or so. 3000lb/cubic yardx232.32 cubic yards=696960lbs/2000lbs/ton=348.48 ~350 tons of stone. A triaxle around here can haul around 23 ton per truck. so thats 15.21 trucks. and at $525/load that is right around $8,000.

That is JUST THE MATERIAL to lay down a 4" layer of stone the .3 miles to your driveway. That is no placement, no ditchwork, and no culverts.

just some food for thought.

 

[oosik]

Unfortunately, what Red Neck says is very true. Driveway maintenance is not cheap. Five year ago I obtained an estimate for delivery of gravel - 12' wide by 4"deep by 5280' long. It was just a bit shy of $18,000. And that was just to deliver and dump it on the driveway - no spreading, no crowning, no rolling etc,etc.

Needless to say - I got two truck loads and repaired a couple muddy spots.

When my driveway was first constructed it was smooth - and folks visiting marveled at how they could go 45 or greater down the driveway. There is a definite advantage to a few rough areas - people complain - I tell them if they would slow down its not bad at all. The driveway will NEVER be like it was originally - I'll be dam sure of that.

Update - I had my driveway constructed in '82 at a cost of $16.5 LARGE.

 

[Capricious]

I hate to say it OP but, it sounds like you are ignorant of road costs(not to be rude). A competent operator can range from $65-$120 per hour depending on the equipment(and not joe schmoe with his tractor). Culverts are on the order of $15/foot and stone around here runs around $525/triaxle load (23 tons-ish). If you think a ton of material goes very far, start figuring out some volumes to lay down a 12' wide road, 4" deep by a few thousand feet. IF that seems expensive, get a quote on paving and that should bring you back to reality. If there is no base to the road and no drainage, its not going to be a cheap fix. You need to do some reading on dirt and gravel road maintenance by the forest service. I know the PA website has a pretty good writeup on it and I also took the class. Control the water or you will never get a handle on it.

For example. .3 milesx5280ft/mile=1584 ft. 1584ftx12ft wide roadx.33ft deep (assuming 4" of stone) =6272.64 ft^3 so we then divide by 27 to get cubic yards. 232.32 yd^3. Now a yard of limestone runs about 3000lbs or so. 3000lb/cubic yardx232.32 cubic yards=696960lbs/2000lbs/ton=348.48 ~350 tons of stone. A triaxle around here can haul around 23 ton per truck. so thats 15.21 trucks. and at $525/load that is right around $8,000.

That is JUST THE MATERIAL to lay down a 4" layer of stone the .3 miles to your driveway. That is no placement, no ditchwork, and no culverts.

just some food for thought.

350 tons, which would be about 700,000 lbs.

What about 2.25 million pounds?
Driveway development

I am almost afraid to think about how much it cost these people to have their "driveway" put in. I always figured about $40,000.00 or so.

 

[paulharvey]

Doesn't have to be a "private" gravel road for there to be problems.

10 years ago I bought a parcel of land fronting on a county gravel road- I was specifically trying to avoid any private roads.

Well, I learned that the county does not maintain this road (which wasn't in too bad of shape 10 years ago.)

This is a "dead end" road less than 1/4 mile long, and one other property owner needs to use it for access. I tried to get them to help me convince
the county to take care of the road, but they never responded. When it became clear the county was not going to work on the road, I asked the property
owner if they would contribute to the cost of maintaining it, and never heard back from them. They are absentee owners, and live about 500 miles away.

If I want the road repaired, I will have to do it myself, and the neighbor will benefit. PLUS, the public will benefit. Just because the county does not maintain
the road does not mean it is not a public road. People use the road to access public property. I cannot legally close it off.

That's just the way it is.

When I worked for the county (Marion County Fl) there where tons of "non-maintained" county roads. The county owned them, but had no obligations. They typically (where all ways supposed too) have white street sign with green letters. The reason is that everything has to be owned by someone, and it is a better set up than an easement with people paying property tax on useless acres. And, no, you can't block it, it's public property. You also can't say anything about non-residents using it.

 

[TnAndy]

I'm in East TN, and you're in WNC, so I suspect the conditions are similar. Our driveway is 1500' of sloping gravel road we put into the property in 1982. My guess is we've spent $30k on the road over the years. Several culverts to carry seasonal water, ditches, countless loads of gravel, working it every time we get a major rain with a tractor/grader blade/box scraper.

Tandem loads of gravel ran $200 when we first started. Now they are closer to $500. Each spring, an entire load disappears somewhere ! After 25 years, we finally got a good base in, and now it only requires a load every couple years to maintain. But one huge rain can cost $500 worth of gravel to repair.

Like anything 'private', you're IT. When the water system needs work, we do it. When the power system needs work, (solar), we do it. Personally, I wouldn't have it any other way, but it's clearly not for everyone.

I completely agree with RedNeck.....you're not appreciating the cost of Private.

 

[davesl708]

Hello,

We recently moved to a more remote area than we are used to, due to my husband's job. We purchased a lovely home....on an AWFUL road, at least in our estimation (I've heard there are worse; I'd hate to see it). It is ruddy, washboarding, etc. We were a little ignorant in making this purchase and weren't properly advised, and hence purchased land on a private road with NO ROAD MAINTENANCE AGREEMENT. Ugh. There is an "unofficial" HOA that collects a small amount of dues (about $200/year from 12ish houses), but it doesn't appear to be sufficient to care for the road properly. The road appeared to be in pretty decent condition when we purchased, but it was summertime and the road had clearly been recently attended to.

Here's my big question: what do we need to do to get this road in proper working order? The current "caretaker" is old, and I suspect he doesn't really know what he is doing. We've gotten some estimates, but these guys want thousands of dollars to help us with just small sections--the more problematic--parts of our road. Like $2000-$3000 for about 600 ish feet. The road, in total, is around 0.3 miles (up to our house, anyway). We're willing to invest some money in this endeavor, knowing that many of the rest of the neighbors will probably refuse to contribute anything more than their current dues. Many of the houses on our road are vacation homes, and the folks that own them don't appear to be there often enough to care. We both have 4 wheel drive, so it's not a huge access issue for us, but it would be awesome to have friends/family over without having to worry if they can make it up the road.

We're in a mountainous area--Western NC--so the road is sloped in some areas--and fairly steep in one section. We've thought about paving, but I doubt we could afford it considering we'd probably have to bear the burden alone....many one day, but not anytime soon. We think we could rent a tractor and perhaps tackle this ourselves to save some $, but we definitely need some tips/help. If that works out, we may invest in purchasing a tractor.

Any advice would be MUCH appreciated. Thank you in advance!

If you have an unofficial HOA then you have no obligation to pay. Use the money to rent or buy a small tractor with a box blade and maintain your section yourself. I would not pay anyone if they are not maintaining the road properly.
I live in a private community and we own the roads and have to maintain them ourselves. The By-laws require proper maintenance and care.