Concrete driveway building in Kirkland WA - a slab that drains and sits flat

Most people call us when the old driveway has cracked through, sunk at the edges or started holding puddles by the garage, and patching it no longer makes sense. The price moves with the size of the driveway, how much old concrete or asphalt has to come out, how much digging and fill the ground needs and the finish you pick, while the schedule mostly turns on the weather and how long that ground work takes. I come out and look at the site myself, and the estimate I give you after that look has your own figure on it.

We start by breaking out and hauling off the old surface, then dig down to firm ground, because a slab only stays flat if the subgrade, the ground it sits on, doesn't move. We bring in base rock, pack it in layers and grade it so water runs toward the street or the yard instead of back at your garage, and this is the part I won't cut to save money, since you can't see it on day one and it's the first thing that shows up as cracks and sinking a few winters later. Then we set the forms and any rebar, the steel inside the slab that holds it together if it does crack, and we don't order the truck until all of that is done, because concrete that sits waiting comes out weaker. On pour day we place it, level it and give it a broom finish, a lightly brushed texture that gives tires and shoes grip in the rain, and we cut control joints, shallow grooves that give the slab a straight place to crack instead of across the middle. After that the concrete needs time to cure, the slow hardening that gives it its strength, so you'll stay off it until we tell you it's ready.

If the driveway runs back to a slab behind the house, we can pour a concrete patio on the same visit so the two sit at the right height and drain the same way. If you'd like more than plain gray, stamped concrete presses a pattern and color into the fresh surface, and it works on a whole driveway or just a border along the edges.

Digging out for a new driveway disturbs the ground, and the City of Kirkland requires a clearing and grading permit for land surface disturbance, so whether your job needs one is something we settle at the estimate instead of guessing. When it does, I'll tell you then, and we take care of the application with the city or walk you through it, so you know where it stands. Kirkland also asks new and rebuilt projects to use low impact development where it's feasible, building in ways that let rainwater soak in on the lot, and once a project adds or replaces more than 2,000 square feet of hard surface, those options have to be evaluated and planting areas get amended soil, dirt worked up so it takes in water better. Pervious concrete, which the city lists as a driveway option, is one way to cut down that runoff, and it's worth talking through if your driveway is large or your yard already holds water.

The city also publishes policies titled Driveway Paving Material for Single Family Driveways, Driveway Policy, and Placing Concrete or Asphalt in Adverse Weather Conditions, and the city's driveway policies page is the place to read what they say. On the ground, what we run into most is rain and slope, with plenty of driveways climbing up from the street and older slabs that tip water back toward the garage. We're based in Kirkland and work across the cities around it, inside city limits and out in the county, and we see the same steep lots and wet winters on driveways in Bellevue and Redmond.