Driveways in Crossways
Block paving, resin bound drives, concrete taken out and patios across Crossways and the DT2 villages. We build the base for the ground you have got.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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If a Crossways drive is cracking in the same lines every year, the surface is not the problem. Ground that moves with the seasons needs a deeper compacted base and a surface that can flex with it, and that is a different job from laying something new over the top.
Old concrete, open lawns and sunken patios are where drives in Crossways go wrong. An old concrete drive that has cracked at the joints and now rocks under a wheel. A frontage that is open lawn and needs to become somewhere to park a second car. Or a patio that has sunk at one corner, holds standing water and has gone slippery in the shade.
We come out, take levels, dig a trial hole to see what base is actually there, and put a written itemised quote in front of you with excavation, sub-base, drainage and surface priced separately. If we think the existing surface can be kept, we will tell you, and quote you the cheaper repair instead.
The work
Estate drives, open frontages and room for a second car
Old concrete taken out, or covered. A lot of the original drives in Crossways are concrete, and concrete does not fail gradually: it holds up for years, then cracks at the bays and starts to see-saw.
Where the slab is still flat and unbroken it will take resin bound stone or new paving straight over the top, which saves the whole cost of breaking it out. Where it is cracked across its width we take it up, and the disposal goes out by grab lorry or skip with the price for it on the quote in advance.
Open frontages that need defining. Plenty of houses in Crossways have no wall or hedge at the front, just lawn running to the pavement, so the parking area has to define itself and there is nothing holding the edge in. We set a haunched edge restraint or a kerb line to give it a clean border, dig the extra area to formation, and lay membrane and a compacted sub-base at the depth the ground needs. Done properly you get a drive that looks deliberate rather than a strip of paving that has crept across a lawn.
The strip in front of a garage door is the part that fails first and matters most, because if the fall runs the wrong way you get water inside. We reset the levels so the surface drops away from the threshold, put a channel drain across the front where the ground is flat, and take that water to a gully or a soakaway rather than letting it lie against the door. Sandy ground takes water quickly, so the aim is to lead it well away from the walls rather than let it pool against the brickwork.
On the newer parts of the village the block paving itself is usually fine and the base under it has settled. We lift the affected bays, re-compact and correct the sub-base, reset to a true fall and re-sand with kiln dried jointing sand, and that takes the weeds and the staining with it, because both come from open joints and standing water. Gardens here are generous, so the patio does not have to be a strip against the back wall, and a second seating area further down the garden is often less work than extending the first, because it needs no drainage work against the building. For that, see patios in Crossways.
How it runs
Digging out and laying a drive on sand and gravel
Thomas comes out, measures up, digs a check hole to see what the ground is, and prices the drive himself. Excavation, muck away, sub base, edgings, surface and drainage are each priced on a separate line. The dig, the base and the surface then go in, in that order.
Most Crossways houses have an open frontage straight off a wide estate road, so a small digger and a grab lorry can usually get in without trouble. The ground here is mostly sand and gravel over sandy bedrock, which drains well but can be loose when dug. We dig to a firm formation, lay a geotextile membrane where the sand is loose or a clay band turns up, and build the sub base in compacted layers. Your access to the door and the garage is kept open at the end of each day, the road is swept, and the spoil goes away with us. If we find an old soakaway, a soft spot or a buried service, Thomas rings you with a photo and a figure before the dig goes further.
Paving a front garden usually counts as permitted development when water can drain through a permeable surface, or when the run off goes onto a lawn or border. Planning permission only comes in over five square metres of solid surface draining onto the highway. A dropped kerb is a separate highway approval from Dorset Council. There is no conservation area over Crossways, so unless your own house is on the Historic England list, the material and colour are up to you.
Cost
What goes under a drive decides most of its cost
We do not price by the square metre, because what is under the surface decides more of the cost than what goes on top.
The ground. On loose sand, the formation is compacted before any stone goes in, and a geotextile membrane under the sub base stops the stone mixing into it. A soft band means a deeper dig, which adds loads to the muck away and material to the base.
Access and layout. An open frontage straight off the estate road is easy to work. A bungalow with a run down the side to a garage, or a house on the edge of Crossways with a long approach, takes longer and may need smaller machines.
The edgings. Kerbs and edgings haunched in concrete stop the surface spreading. On block paving, they are what keeps the blocks tight.
The water. Sand and gravel usually takes water well, so a soakaway often works here once a pit test confirms it. A permeable surface still needs somewhere for the water to go, and a sealed one may need a channel drain and a proper outfall. Approved Document H covers new drainage.
The surface. Block paving, resin bound, tarmac and gravel all price differently, and the choice here is yours.
Get each firm to state the depth and type of sub base, where surface water is going, and who removes the spoil.
If it is urgent
Water standing by the garage or a slab that trips
A drive is rarely a true emergency, but some faults get worse fast. Water standing in front of a garage door, or a slab that has tipped enough to catch a foot on the way to the bins, needs sorting before winter.
Where water does stand, it washes fine sand out from under the sub base and spreads the problem. Mark any trip hazard, and clear leaves from gully grates and channel drains. The first visit makes it safe, with the worst blocks relaid or the drain cleared. Then we find out why before quoting for a lasting repair. Our usual hours are Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. When it will not wait, a phone call is quicker than the form, and we return missed calls as soon as we can.
The one local thing
Fast draining ground, and what to build on it
The ground around Crossways is mostly sand and gravel, and it drains fast. That does not make it forgiving: loose sand that was never compacted settles under a car. It is why a rigid concrete slab on a thin base cracks in the same places year after year while a flexible surface on a deep, properly compacted sub-base stays level.
Block paving and resin bound stone over a good depth of crushed stone are far more forgiving here than a big continuous pour, and where a patio has to be rigid we get the base right and put the movement joints where they belong rather than waiting for the ground to choose.
The other half of it is where the water ends up. On fast draining ground, water poured into one spot beside a foundation can wash out fine material under the footing, and that makes soakaway position a real design decision. Approved Document H expects a soakaway to sit well clear of the building, five metres being the usual figure, and there is no point putting one where the ground will not accept water anyway, which is what a percolation test is for.
Mature trees complicate it further: they draw water from the ground around them, and their roots will lift a surface that has been laid straight over them. We would rather design the drive around the tree, or bridge the roots on a deeper base, than lay something that will be uneven within two years.
Who you are dealing with
Your drive, measured and priced by the owner
We come 21.8 miles from our base in Boscombe to lay drives in Crossways, and we cover Moreton, Woodsford and the DT2 villages east of Dorchester. Planning and dropped kerb applications go to Dorset Council. The company is Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales with company number 15471719. Before you book a visit in Crossways, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
The owner, Thomas Hannen, measures the drive, digs a check hole and writes the price. We have a verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. There is no fee for the visit or for the line by line written quote.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Crossways?
Most repairs in Crossways need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.
| Question | In Crossways |
|---|---|
| Who decides | Dorset Council is the planning authority for Crossways. Dorset Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | None covers Crossways, so a like-for-like repair is ordinary maintenance. |
| Listed buildings | Nothing in Crossways is on the statutory list, so listed building consent does not come into it. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Crossways. |
Questions
Questions about driveways in Crossways
Crossways has no conservation area. Is the surface our choice?
Usually it is, because no conservation area covers Crossways, so unless your house is itself listed, which the Historic England list will confirm, nobody is judging the look of a frontage and the ordinary permitted development position applies. Dorset Council's interest is the drainage, and the crossing over the footway if a new one is being formed. That is not the case everywhere round here, and it turns the decision into a practical one about wear and water.
Will a solid slab or terrace crack on Crossways ground?
Rigid surfaces can. Crossways ground is mostly sand and gravel, and where it was never compacted it settles unevenly, so a concrete slab or rigidly bedded stone terrace shows that movement straight into its joints. Block paving and gravel ride it out because they are made of small pieces over a flexible base. Where a seamless finish is wanted, the base goes deeper and the falls stop water standing in one place.
Does fast draining ground still need a test hole?
It does, because a garden is not a geology map. Crossways ground is freely draining, so infiltration is usually the right answer, but the top metre of any plot is whatever the builder left behind, and made ground can hold water when the ground beside it does not. A pit dug and timed on the day settles which of the two you have, and it decides the entire drainage design.
Crossways is a fair way west. Do you work out there?
Yes. It is around twenty two miles from base, far enough that the job is planned as full days rather than short visits, so materials arrive in one delivery and the dig, the base and the surface run on consecutive days. It also means the survey and the pricing happen on one trip. Thomas Hannen comes out, measures, digs the check hole and writes the quote from what he finds.
Is winter a problem for laying on ground that drains?
Less of one than on heavy ground. Freely draining ground at Crossways means a dig does not turn to soup after a wet night, so excavation and base building carry on through the colder months. What weather does control is the finish: bound and resin surfaces want dry, warmer conditions to cure, and mortar bedding will not go down into a frost. So the base goes in and the top waits for a window.
Nearby, and next door
Driveways near Crossways
Nearby places we also cover for driveways, with straight-line distances from Crossways, and the other trades we offer in Crossways itself.
Driveways nearby
Our other trades in Crossways
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Get a written price for your drive or patio
Free site visit in Crossways, a free itemised quote, and a trial hole dug before anyone tells you what your drive needs.