Driveways in Lilliput

The base comes first. Nearly every failed drive failed from below. We excavate to firm formation, lay a geotextile membrane, and build the sub-base in compacted layers to a depth that suits the ground and the weight of the car. Any old concrete that rocks comes out. Muck away goes to a grab lorry or a skip, planned around the road outside.

Block paving. Blocks forgive settlement better than anything else: one that dips can be pulled up and reset and nobody will ever see where. The price of that is a solid edge. A kerb or edge restraint set in a concrete haunch stops the outer rows walking outwards under the tyres. Kiln dried sand is swept into the joints on the day and again after a few weeks of use. Choose the permeable kind, with wider joints over an open graded base, and the rain goes into the ground under your own drive.

Resin, tarmac and concrete. Resin bound gravel drains through itself and looks tidy, but it wants a firm, dry, level base and has to go down in a single pour. Tarmac is the one to pick where the drive climbs from the road, because it grips on a slope and shrugs off a car turning on full lock. Concrete, whether plain or pattern imprinted, lasts, but water cannot pass through it and a repair always shows, so falls and a drain are part of the design, not an afterthought.

Natural stone and porcelain. Sawn sandstone, granite setts or a porcelain slab on a full mortar bed make a handsome drive for light cars, with pointing that is looked after. We say when a surface will not take the weight you plan to put on it.

Trees and walls in Evening Hill. Part of Lilliput lies in the Evening Hill conservation area, where most tree work needs six weeks' notice to the council. A new drive dug near a protected tree, or one that needs a branch cut back for the grab lorry, is flagged at the first visit so that notice runs before the start date. Where a front wall or hedge has to come down for a wider opening, we check first whether the change of look needs the council's view.

Drainage. A Lilliput drive has to fall away from the house and stay 150mm below the damp proof course. On a drive that falls towards the building, a channel drain across the bottom takes the water to a soakaway or a proper outfall, never just onto the pavement.

Mending rather than replacing. Wheel ruts, one sunken corner, a kerb knocked loose, a puddle that sits by the garage door, oil marks, weeds in every joint. Plenty of these take a day or two to put right, and if that is all your drive needs, that is what we quote for.

No rate per square metre, because what is under it decides more of the cost than what goes on top.

Getting to it. A frontage on Sandbanks Road with the bus route outside, a drive that climbs from the road on one of the streets rising from the harbour, and a level drive off a quiet road near Lilliput Road call for different methods before a machine arrives. Everything arrives and everything leaves by the same route. A drive you can back a lorry onto is cheaper to build than one where every barrow goes through a side gate.

The sub base. The part you never see is the part that decides whether the surface is still flat in ten years. Ground conditions, how deep it has to be dug and how much muck goes away are the real variables.

Water, and where it is allowed to go. Surface water has to be dealt with on the property rather than run into the road, which means a permeable surface or somewhere for it to soak away. That is a design decision with a cost, not an afterthought.

Comparing quotes? Ask how deep the dig is and what sub base is going in, where the surface water is going, whether the edgings are haunched, and who takes the spoil away.

We lay drives across Lilliput and the rest of BH14, along Sandbanks Road and Lilliput Road to Evening Hill and Salterns, and on to Whitecliff, Canford Cliffs and Penn Hill, from our base in Boscombe, about five miles away.

BCP Council is both the planning and the highway authority. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free. Before you book a visit in Lilliput, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Lilliput 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.