Well, paying someone else to do it. Reasons for it; I hate cutting the front yard, it looks scruffy. The existing concrete drive was done, with several cracks across it. But most importantly, my MX5 has been essentially trapped in the garage, due to the logistics to move the Jag around., for the last 2 years. I also have a theory that a decent drive essentially pays for itself.
There is a distinct slope up to the right. I’m never going to get a horizontal drive (in two directions)
We decided halfway through the project that a retaining wall will be needed on the right, and that I might as well get rid of the ugly corporation slabs used as steps up to the front door, instead rotating the stairs 90 degrees, and built in brick.
Plan bricks with cemented edging. Cost for this lot is £7600.
Nice job mate. I’ve got a decent drive at the moment, took a while to get it there plus the double garage. Unfortunately, I’m gonna be like you shortly as we’ve just sold the house and bought another and will have to do this all over again lol. Looking forward to seeing your finished drive, should look great and give you s nice place to work on the car. Plus, less gardening! Bonus!
Perhaps you could think of the slope as being an advantage.
Make up a couple of ramps, perhaps from bits of (say) 2" x 6" and other scraps to counter the slope, then drive the car out from garage onto them for a level car with access from under while lying on the slope beneath. One of my very old friends in Wales did this many years ago, the only subtlety he added was some scraps of 1/4" ribbed rubber matting nailed on underneath to help the ramps grip the concrete of his drive. Alas he no longer has the suppleness to slither around under his cars and pays the local garage instead.
Myself I’d have welded up some angle because it would probably be lighter and easier to handle, but he was a chippy and the wood was free leftovers from the building sites. Until he got a Harley he also had room in his garage to store them.
I had thought about steel rails that extend from the garage, like trailer ramps, a couple of legs that flop down onto the drive. I then drive out on the rails.
But dismissed that as a lunatic idea.
I was never any good at school with woodwork, so can’t be trusted the screw together a set of shelves.
I did mine similar but instead of briquettes I had it concrete also got an apex roof on my garage as the flat one was leaking and needed replacing lots more storage space now. Are you going to drop the kerbstones so people can’t park in front of it ?
Haven’t worked out how to post photos yet.
Wasn’t sure you could put an Apex roof on a single skin garage. Garage is tiny (narrow) and there is no real fix for that besides major excavations, which likely are not financially worth it (no plans to stay in this house long term, garage improvements don’t add that much). I just have to make the best of it. I don’t need to lift a car to get under it, but I would like to be able to do brake,. suspension jobs. I have space to work on one side of the car at a time. Ok for length.
Garage is pretty worn out; 50 year old door, which a previous owner handpainted Chelsea FC blue, flat roof is patched up, back wall is into a bank, so is damp to touch. Plan is to put in a french drain, but I might also use a tanking slurry on the walls. Then replace door, roof.
Already have a dropped kerb. I think I will be very unpopular if I changed my entire frontage to be a dropped kerb.
Having a fully paved frontage parkers notice that more and refrain from parking there over a driveway like mine with a single car width driveway.
Have the same over the road, full width paved front with only a part dropped kerb, where do they park, yep blocking mine never theirs.
I had issues with folk completely blocking my drive - parking across the whole width of my 3 kerbstone wide dropped kerb - also when that wasn’t happening folk were parking directly opposite on the other side of the (quite narrow) street with somebody else on “my” grass verge & another car on the footpath across next door’s section of the shared dropped area meaning that, again, it was impossible for me to get my car in & out.
I resorted to having my - narrow - drive widened & another 2 dropped kerbs put in to match in 2017; this now provides a lot more room to manoeuvre. Still a few issues with people parking across the end of my dropped kerb hence the notice & the H-Bar but for me things have been much better since I had the work done. £1,270 altogether for the extra concrete, drainage & kerbing work plus a £90 planning application for permission to alter the kerb - relatively cheap & cheerful I know. To be honest the original part of the drive’s starting to come to the end of its life so I’ll probably have the whole lot block paved like Saz9961 at some point in the future - the main reason I had my work done though was to ensure that I could get my car in & out when I needed to.
An added bonus is that there’s now plenty of room to wash my car on the drive which was a bit tricky to do before due to the lack of width.
Seems apparent that a couple of neighbours aren’t happy, but they’re the ones who were causing the majority of the issues in the first place - both of whom have more than adequate off-road parking for their vehicles but one in particular can’t be bothered to use it. He told me that it didn’t matter if I couldn’t get my car out because I didn’t use it for work & if I was unable to get out when I needed to then I could always go out another time!
Nice job. Just watch using ramps or trolley jack. Made some nice dents in my new tarmac surface. Shouldn’t be an issue with blocks, but strongly recommend you spread the load to prevent blocks being pushed down
The reason I had my drive done was because of the angle it was to the road and neighbours continuously parking opposite making it nigh on impossible to manoeuvre out plus having 2 cars & a single drive had to park on the grass or on the road to get other out. Neighbours response was pay my road tax so can park where I want got no pictures yet so can’t put any on … will take some soon.
How did you get lines painted on road.?
Applied to the Council, paid a £70 assessment fee for them to visit & check that the drive & kerb were fully compliant. Then a further £90 for them to come out & paint the line…
