Too thick of gravel drive?

[Cord]

Is it possible to have to too thick of a gravel driveway? My contractor is mixing what he typically does with what the builder is recommending and I think it might be overkill. I will have a 550 foot long drive, 10 feet wide, Pretty flat, and no trees.

He's going to dig 12 inches deep (I think the topsoil is 9-11" deep) and then fill with 12" #2 stone and then 4" of #304. He recommends not spending more on the geofabric since we will have so much stone, but will put it in if I want. I feel like it's overkill, but his bid is in line with others.

We'll do top too dress later which would add another 2-4" down the road.

Sounds like he's actually doing the job right. To have a driveway that doesn't go soft in spring, you need a really good base and that's what he's giving you. I've had both types of drives and it's surprising how important the base is.

 

[RedNeckRacin]

Geo is a good option with extremely poor underfoot or if you want to cut down your amount of stone. 12" of stone and geo for a driveway sounds a bit much but I'm a fan of do it once overkill and you never have to worry about it.

 

[LD1]

Yep, geo is for trying to build over swampland. Bottomless muck.

Or, as mentioned, to reduce stone. But since they are scraping away 12" of topsoil......you really dont want to put down geo and 4" of stone and then have a driveway that is 8" below grade.

If you only had a thin topsoil layer, you could scrape down to clay, lay geo, and save some stone instead of scraping out a bunch of extra clay for no reason. But that dont sound like your case.

You could also choose to only scrape about half the topsoil, lay in geo, and save on some stone. But If given the choice of geo over topsoil vs just a thicker gravel base over clay......I'd go with all gravel any day. And if you have alot of construction going on/house building......all that extra topsoil is gonna come in handy when it comes time for a lawn. CAuse most contractors dont separate topsoil from fill when digging a basement or doing a septic. IT all goes into one pile and all gets smoothed out later. With lots of clay on the surface and most of your topsoil buried, or mixed and diluted to the point it might as well not be there....its makes getting a lawn established and maintained VERY high maintenance.

 

[RedNeckRacin]

right on ld, I will add to make sure you add cross pipes if you need them before the driveway goes in. and make sure you direct the water don't let it find its own course. Topsoil is very handy to have a pile laying around if needed.

 

[LD1]

Topsoil is very handy to have a pile laying around if needed.

Certainly a whole lot handier than a pile of clay.

 

[polkwrangler]

on my driveway they took about 8 inches of topsoil off,had crushed concrete backfilled and then asphalt millings on top never had an issue and its roughly 8 years since done

 

[Egon]

Seems I recall building a road meant removing the top organic material and then building up and shaping the road with clay packed as you go. Ditches, cuts and borrow pits supplied clay for the roadbed.

 

[Streetcar]

Geo fabric is rarely used for road construction, geo grid is used based on the type of subgrade. Geogrid looks similar to the orange construction fence.
Not sure of the soil types in sunbury
Cincinnati has some of the highest landslide cost/resident in the country. I have used geogrid on many roads
In Ohio gravel is specified by sieve size usually single digit( with 57s being between a 5 and 7 in size) or ODOT specification which is thee digits

 

[LD1]

Little different process between building a road and building a driveway.

Removing organic top layer is the same as building a road. But once there, instead of tearing up the rest of the property to "borrow" clay from, and have compactors, and lots more excavation work involved, it is simply cheaper and easier to truck in base rock to build/shape the drive. Which sounds exactly like what they are going to do

 

[LD1]

Any updates here either?