A driveway out here is not a landscaping job. It is a small road, and it either gets built like one or you rebuild it every two years.
I build limerock and millings drives, cut the ditch and set the culvert, crown them so the water leaves, and roll them. I also haul the rock, which means the material and the machine arrive the same morning instead of a week apart.
Free estimateCall (352) 932-3653
What I get called about
- Ruts you have to steer around, and washboard that rattles the truck
- Potholes that come back three weeks after somebody fills them
- Water standing in the drive, or running down it and taking it with it
- Sand that will not hold anything, so the rock keeps disappearing into it
- A drive that dead ends at a ditch with no culvert, or a crushed one
- A drive too narrow for a delivery truck, a horse trailer, or a fire truck
- A new lot with no drive at all and a builder who needs access before he mobilizes
- Gravel somebody put down that has scattered into the grass
Why the sand up here will not hold a driveway on its own
This is the piece that explains almost every failed driveway in this county.
The soil on the Lake Wales Ridge, running through Umatilla, Eustis, Mount Dora and most of the high ground around Altoona, is deep sand with essentially nothing else in it. No clay, no silt, nothing sticky. That is fantastic for a drainfield and it is terrible for a road.
Sand has no cohesion. It will not hold a shape, it will not hold a crown, and it has almost no bearing on its own. Pile rock on top of loose sand and the rock migrates down into it. Two years later the drive looks bare again and the owner assumes he got cheated on the tonnage. He did not. The rock is still there, it is just eight inches lower than where it started.
Two things fix that. Either a base thick enough to bridge, or a stabilized subgrade with clay worked into it so the rock has something to sit on. On a long drive that keeps washboarding, stabilizing the subgrade fixes the actual problem instead of adding two more inches of rock every couple of years.
I will tell you which one your drive needs when I walk it. Sometimes the answer is that you have a drainage problem wearing a driveway costume, and no amount of rock will touch it.
Limerock, millings, or #57
| Best for | How it holds up | Looks like | Watch out for | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Limerock base | Driveways, road base, under a slab or pavers, parking | Cements up and gets harder over its first year | White to grey, bright in sun | White dust in dry weather, and it tracks into the house |
| Asphalt millings | Drives where you want a finished look that stays put | Re-binds in Florida heat and firms into a semi-solid surface | Dark, close to a paved drive | Do not place it near a well or in a wetland buffer without checking the site |
| #57 | Drainage, French drains, around footings, mud spots | Does not bind at all. Loose on purpose | Clean, uniform, no fines | Will not hold a crown. Migrates into sand without fabric under it |
Short version. Building a driveway: limerock base, or millings on top of limerock base if you want the dark finish. Solving a drainage problem: #57. Trying to build a driveway out of #57 because it looks clean: do not. There are no fines in it, so nothing locks together, and in a year it is in your grass.
Millings deserve one extra note. They work in Florida because the residual asphalt binder in them softens in the heat and re-cements the surface after it is rolled. Properly placed and compacted, a millings drive can go ten to twenty years and it gets harder rather than looser. It is the best looking budget driveway available in this county.
There is one thing I check before I place millings, and almost nobody mentions it: regulators have raised questions about what leaches out of reclaimed asphalt. The standard caution is to look twice before placing it within fifty feet of a water well, inside a wetland buffer, or under strict stormwater rules. Out here that matters, because nearly everybody rural is on a private well and this is karst country over the Floridan Aquifer. If your well is close to where the drive goes, I will tell you and we will use limerock instead. It is not a big deal to work around and it is a bad thing to find out later.
What building a driveway actually involves
Six steps, and skipping any of them is how a drive fails.
- Clear and grub the run. Roots and organic material under a driveway rot out and leave you a soft spot. They have to come out, not get buried.
- Cut to subgrade and shape it. This is where the crown gets built, in the dirt, before any rock. A crown built out of rock alone will flatten.
- Fix the soft spots. Wet or muck areas get dug out and replaced. Rock over mud makes mud with rock in it, and that is the single most common reason a driveway gets built twice.
- Set the culvert, if there is a ditch. Sized so the ditch keeps running, bedded properly, and headwalled or mitered so the ends do not blow out.
- Place the base in lifts and roll each one. Four to six inches compacted for a residential drive on decent ground. Six to eight where trucks, concrete trucks or loaded trailers will run. One thick lift does not compact through, whatever anybody tells you.
- Tie the apron. Where the drive meets the pavement, either a rock transition done right or a poured concrete apron. That first eight feet takes more abuse than the rest of the drive combined.
The state road specification behind all of this calls for a limerock bearing ratio of one hundred and compaction to not less than ninety eight percent of maximum density. Your driveway does not need a density test. It does need somebody who knows the number exists and builds to it anyway.
The culvert and the ditch
Nearly every rural drive in this county crosses a ditch, and the culvert is where most of them fail.
Undersized pipe backs water up onto the neighbor. No headwall and the ends erode until the pipe is sitting in air. Crushed pipe from a truck driving over it before it had cover. Pipe set too high, so the ditch holds water on both sides of your drive.
I size it, set it, bed it and finish the ends. If your drive comes off a county road, the county has its own requirements for that connection, and I will tell you what I know and tell you to confirm it with them rather than guessing on your behalf.
A driveway culvert package is something nobody in this market prices, and it is on nearly every rural driveway job. Ask for it as a line item and you will get one.
Repair, regrade, or rebuild
Not every bad driveway needs a new driveway.
Regrade. If the rock is still there but the surface is rutted and the crown is gone, sometimes it just needs to be scarified, reshaped and rolled with a few tons of topping. Cheapest fix and it buys years.
Repair. Potholes, one bad soft spot, a blown culvert end, a washed shoulder. Spot work.
Rebuild. If the base is gone into the sand, if the drive holds water because there is no crown and no shoulder, or if it was never built with a base at all, patching it is throwing money at it. I will tell you which one you have got and I will tell you when regrading is the better buy, even though it is the smaller invoice.
What it costs
Nobody in Florida publishes a real number for this, which is strange, because it is the first thing anybody asks. I am not going to publish one either, and I would rather tell you why than pretend.
A drive is priced by the foot, and the foot changes. It moves with the length, the width, the depth of base, how much has to come out before anything goes down, whether the ground is wet, whether a culvert has to go in, and how far the rock has to travel. Limerock is hauled into this county from Marion, Citrus, Levy and Sumter, so the freight is a real part of your number and I will not hide it inside an average.
You get a written number after I walk it, and that number holds.
Material only, if you would rather do it yourself
Plenty of people want the rock and want to spread it themselves. That is fine and I will sell you the load.
Price a load of limerock Price a load of millings Work out how much you need
Bring me in for the part you do not want to do. A lot of people have me cut and shape the subgrade and set the culvert, then spread the topping themselves. Say so and I will quote it that way.
Good fit for me, and what to call somebody else about
Good fit
residential and farm drives, one car length up to a quarter mile of access road. New builds, rebuilds, regrades and topping. Limerock, millings and #57. Culvert set, bedded and ended. Aprons where your drive meets the county road. Access roads cut in so a builder can get a truck to the back of a property.
Call somebody else for
hot asphalt paving, decorative or stamped concrete drives, paver drives, anything inside a platted subdivision with an HOA specification I have not seen, and commercial parking lots that need striping and a stormwater design. I will say so on the phone rather than waste your week.
Questions
What does a limerock driveway cost?
Nobody in Florida publishes a number for this, which is odd since it is the first thing anybody asks. I am not going to publish one either, and I would rather tell you why than pretend. A drive is priced by the foot, and the foot moves with the width, the depth of base, how much has to come out first, whether the ground is soft, and how far the rock has to be hauled. Limerock comes into this county from Marion, Citrus, Levy and Sumter, so freight is a real part of the number and I will show you that rather than bury it.
Limerock or millings?
Limerock is the base material. It cements up over its first year and it carries load. Millings look like a paved drive, re-bind in the Florida heat, and hold up very well in rain. The best answer for most people is limerock base with millings on top, because you get the structure and the finish. Millings alone over sand will move. One caution on millings: if your well is close to where the drive goes, or you are near a wetland buffer, I will look at that first and we may use limerock instead.
How deep does the base need to be?
Four to six inches compacted for a normal residential drive on decent ground. Six to eight where trucks, concrete trucks or loaded trailers will run. Soft or wet spots get dug out and replaced first, because rock over mud just makes mud with rock in it. And the depth is only half of it. A drive that lasts has a crown so the water runs off and shoulders so it has somewhere to go. A flat eight inch drive will rut and a crowned four inch one will not.
Do I need a culvert, and who permits it?
If your drive crosses a ditch, yes, and it needs to be sized so the ditch keeps running rather than backing water onto your neighbor. If you are connecting to a county road, the county has its own requirements for that connection and you will want to confirm them directly rather than take my word for it. I size it, set it, bed it and finish the ends so they do not blow out.
How long will a millings driveway last?
Ten to twenty years is realistic with proper placement and compaction. Millings keep hardening after they go down, because the residual asphalt binder in them softens in the heat and re-cements the surface. That is the opposite of gravel, which is at its best the day it is dumped and scatters from there.
Can you fix my driveway instead of rebuilding it?
Often, and I will tell you when that is the better buy even though it is the smaller invoice. If the rock is still in there and the crown is just gone, scarifying, reshaping, adding some topping and rolling it buys you years. If the base has migrated down into the sand or there was never a base at all, patching it is throwing money at it. I will tell you which one you have.
Free estimateCall (352) 932-3653