Driveway Paving in Seattle

Because the driveway is acting as a catchment with nowhere to discharge. Most Seattle lots slope down from the street toward the house, so the drive collects both its own rainfall and whatever runs off the front garden, and delivers all of it to the lowest point — which is the garage threshold. If the original build had no drain there, or has one that has silted up, the water simply pools. The fix is usually a channel drain across the drive just short of the garage, piped to a real discharge point, combined with regrading the last few feet so water reaches the drain rather than the door.

Concrete is the default here and a reasonable one — it costs less than pavers, handles the climate well, and looks clean for years if jointed properly. Its weakness is that it will eventually crack and a repair never blends. Pavers cost more up front but flex with the small ground movement our wet winters and till subsoil produce, and a damaged or oil-stained area lifts out and gets reset invisibly. Asphalt is cheapest per square foot and suits a long drive, but needs resealing periodically. On a typical city lot we recommend pavers where the budget allows and concrete where it does not.

Sometimes, and it is always worth asking. If the base underneath is sound and the problem is purely surface — worn asphalt, tired paver colour, surface crazing on concrete — then an overlay or a lift-and-relay is a genuine saving. If the failure is structural, resurfacing is money spent hiding a problem that reappears through the new surface within two winters. The tell is differential movement: cracks with one side higher than the other, sections that rock, or dips along the wheel lines all say the base has failed. We will tell you which you have before quoting either.

It depends entirely on the surface. A paver driveway is ready as soon as the jointing is compacted, usually the same day the last unit goes down, because nothing is curing. Poured concrete needs to gain strength before it takes a vehicle load — foot traffic first, vehicles considerably later — and driving on it early causes damage you cannot see until it appears as a crack. Asphalt is walkable quickly but stays soft enough to scuff, so tight turning on a warm day will mark it. We give you the specific timeline in writing rather than a rule of thumb.