Concrete driveway building in Peoria IL - water that runs away from your garage

Most folks call us when the old driveway has cracked into a jigsaw puzzle, sunk at one end or started holding a puddle right where you step out of the car. The price mostly turns on how big the driveway is, whether the old one has to be torn out and hauled off, whether it needs steel in it for heavier vehicles and whether the approach at the street changes. The schedule turns on the city's sign-off for any approach work, the weather, and the curing time, which is the wait while the concrete hardens enough to carry a car. If the approach changes, we sort out the city side before anything gets poured, and the estimate is where you get your own figure. We're based in Peoria and work across the cities around it, out toward Bloomington and Normal too.

Before we talk about the mix, I ask what you park and what the ground is like, because a sedan on firm clay and a pickup towing a camper over soft fill need different slabs. Then we dig out the sod, roots and soft dirt and pack the base in, since the subgrade, the dirt your slab sits on, is what actually holds it up. We set the grade so water heads away from the garage and off the edges instead of pooling where you walk. Trade guidance calls for concrete with a set amount of tiny air bubbles mixed in on driveways that see freezing, thawing or road salt, and a higher-strength mix doesn't make up for leaving that air out, so the air range has to be on the order before the truck is loaded. We pour, smooth it and give it a broom finish, a light dragged texture so tires and boots grip when it's wet. If the budget gets tight, I'll steer you to cut the fancy finish before the base, because you can dress up a surface later but you can't fix what's under it without tearing the whole thing out.

Plenty of folks pour a concrete patio out back while the crew and trucks are already there. If plain gray isn't your style, stamped concrete on a border or walkway gives the driveway some character without changing what's underneath.

Peoria's rules for a driveway cover the drive approach, the stretch where your driveway meets the street, because it sits in the right-of-way, the public strip along the street that the city controls. Peoria Public Works approves any new or replaced approach, and a driveway that crosses a public sidewalk or parkway needs a city permit. Adding an approach, or moving, widening or otherwise changing the one you have, also takes a site plan approved by the Planning Department and Public Works, and Public Works inspects the work before the concrete goes in. Before we schedule, we work out what the city wants for your driveway, handle the permit paperwork when it's ours to file and tell you plainly if anything falls on your end, so nothing gets poured until the city side is settled.

When we tear out old driveways around Peoria, we often find a thin base that was never packed and an approach that has cracked and settled where it meets the street, which is why the city side comes up on so many of these jobs. We see the same tired approaches on jobs in East Peoria and Washington, and we plan to dig out what's underneath rather than pour new concrete over it.