While talking to the excavator's young employee/apprentice(?) one day, I commented that I had not imagined that the driveway would be such a process. His response- "Neither did we!" Apparently this was as much of a frustration for them as it was for us. At this point I'm really hoping that the contract we signed with them was an agreed-on final price, not an estimate. I'm sure there was much more gravel, sand and clay carted in, and time spent on moving it all around, than was initially estimated.
After a summer of drought, the rain returned the week after we broke ground. When we finally got rain, the ruts made by the trucks filled with water that had nowhere to drain to. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos of the driveway at it's worst, but trust me, it was a mess! The clay holds water like a bowl; you can add more sand and gravel, but it stays loose and just squishes under any pressure. Rain every few days made it impossible for it to dry out enough to solidify. The last couple weeks have been dryer, and the rains lighter so it finally dried out and they brought in more sand and gravel. Yesterday they did the final grading and packing. Only one more day of heavy loads still ahead (the cement for the slabs) and then everything else will be much more driveway-friendly.
After all the mess and stress and fuss, the end result is pretty nice!
As an indication of the amount of additional sand and gravel brought in, before the trucks did so much damage, the front edge of the tree patch straight ahead (below) was about a foot higher than the driveway. Now they are even.
They packed in the driveway up against the house all the way across the front face, including areas where I expected I would put some flower beds. Given how much trouble they've had, I don't blame them for making it all as solid as possible, and this was a factor never discussed. I expect there will be raised beds in some of these areas in years to come.
No comments:
Post a Comment