residential sidewalk replacement - help

[urban1]

I have about 40 feet of sidewalk in my front yard that needs to be replace - about 25 feet from the city sidewalk to my front step and another 15 feet from the front step leading to the side of the house. The sidewalk is about 31 inches wide with a slightly wider area around the steps. Theres a slight decline from the stairs to the city sidewalk.

Im looking for advice for a cost-effective and easy way to replace this. Im looking for something reasonably attractive and dont want plain ole concrete. I like the idea of exposed aggregate (costly?) or paving stones.

Im thinking of something such as renting a bin, wrecking the concrete myself, and installing paving stone myself. Will the savings be worth doing it myself or should I just hire someone?

Will it be hard to find someone to do a job this size (Im assuming its small and many wont want to touch it.)

Any advice or any recommendation of a concrete or paving stone guy, Im all ears.

[Jedi Ninja]

Exposed aggregate used to cost around $10-$11 / sqft when I got it. (If you have an incline, you may require steps as well, which would add to the cost.) Pavers may be cheaper if done yourself, but it is back-breaking work and you have maintenance issues like weeds growing through the cracks, etc.. Another option is stamped concrete, which can look quite nice.

[4X4]

10-11 sounds reasonable for residential (exposed). That would probably include break out of your old crap. Broom finish should be less and pattern stamp will be more. Consider what the property is worth to you. If you want more info, pm me.

[ken0042]

What I did was bought concrete dye from Burnco, and then moulds from Lee Valley. The moulds are supposed to be the type where you pour the concrete in, let it set a few minutes, then lift the mould. I used it as kind of a stamp. The thing I learned the hard way is it makes a nicer finished product if you don't press the mould in too far.

[Rathji]

I used to install paving stone patios for a living and would totally suggest doing it yourself over paying someone to do it.

Style is totally up to you but I always love the finished look of Expocrete's cobble, looks like this:



Runs about 400 bucks for 11 square meters. The style hides and actually benefits from minor imperfections in the rows when you lay them.

Stay away from anything that is strictly square, like Expocrete's Decor, or Holland or anything that requires an intricate pattern because a minor error will make it look like total crap.

I will see if I can't find some pictures on my computer of stuff we used to do.

Edit: No pictures but I thought I might give you a basic run down of what you need to do to do this. I am pretty sure Home Depot or Rona sells a 1-2-3 book that covers most of this stuff.

- Excavate down 6-7 inches from the level you want the finished sidewalk.
- Put in road crush (3/4 inch unwashed agg) in 2 inch layers until you are 3 inches from your finished layer. (~4 inches total)
- Pack it with a plate compactor after every level. These cost 50 bucks a day to rent. Make sure it is minorly damp or it will not pack properly.
- Put in Snap Edge to border the area where the pad will be.
- Add ~1 inch sand. (Washed)
- Level with landscape rake or a long 1X4 board
- Lay stones
- Check to ensure your leveling job was good enough by examining the sidewalk, it is 100% easier to do this now than after you finish. Pull up and relevel any areas that are dipping etc.
- Sweep*dry* sand in between the cracks of the stones, use the plate compactor (no water) to help ensure it settles fully. You can use polymeric sand for this part, it had binder in it so it hardens solid after it gets wet. Make sure your sidewalk is perfect before you use this stuff, it is like murder getting stones out to fix it if something is wrong at this point.

Anyway, that is probably way more info than you were expecting. Feel free to ask if you have any questions.

I got all my product at Expocrete, or Ornamental Landscape (an Expocrete reseller). Their roman stones are by far the best in look of all we ever tried.

Edit: I just realized you were doing step as well. That could be done with a retaining wall, like Allen Block, Pisa. They make good steps 7-5/8 inch high with capstone on them. The back of the caps make a fantastic edge for the paving stones

[urban1]

Thanks for the info. 4X4 I may PM in the near future for some more info.

Any other suggestions are still welcome. Im hoping with the slowdown in new home building it might be easier to get someone out to do a smaller job.

[Table 5]

My parents are looking to build some sort of patio in their backyard and are looking at various options of concrete/tile etc. Naturally they turned to me for help since apparently graphic designer also equals landscape architect.

Besides, expocrete, anyone know of other companies/resources/websites to look at?

[Rathji]

Look at Expocrete product, but unless you are a contractor they won't deal with you, so you either need to find a contractor to do the purchase or go to Ornamental Garden (behind Deerfoot Mall) as they retail all Expocrete products.

What I would suggest as a general starting point, without knowing anything about the yard is to use a 2 color blend (Either Charcoal + Rustic or Rustic + Northern depending on the house colors) of Roman Cobble and depending on the area incorporating a circle package or 2 (as shown here). Roman Euro is fine too, but is a bit more expensive and slightly harder to lay. Don't go with any perfectly square (or rectangle) blocks because they are a lot harder to lay properly (angles need to be 90 degrees exactly and if there is any gradual shift it makes blocks not fit)

I have pictures of a bunch of my old jobs at home, that I will post if I remember, but in the mean time here are soem random stuff from Google.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/expocrete/4188844648/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/expocre...in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/expocre...n/photostream/ ( As you can see, the non-circle pattern is a bit of a massive blob without some circles to break it up)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/expocre...n/photostream/ (you see in this one how you can incorporate a path and a circle )

If you need to raise one edge to make it level, I suggest using a stone retaining wall like Allen Block so it will look really good. Agai, I have some pictures I can post from home.


edit: hah, I just realized I had a very similar post a few posts back - amazing what you forget you posted.

[Table 5]

Thanks Rathji, some great thoughts there. At first my parents were looking to use stamped concrete, but most of that stuff looks rather cheesy I think. I prefer the block/tile approach myself.

Do you have any recommendations for contractors to do this type of stuff?

[Ironhorse]

Originally Posted by Rathji

I used to install paving stone patios for a living and would totally suggest doing it yourself over paying someone to do it.

[snip]

- Excavate down 6-7 inches from the level you want the finished sidewalk.
- Put in road crush (3/4 inch unwashed agg) in 2 inch layers until you are 3 inches from your finished layer. (~4 inches total)
- Pack it with a plate compactor after every level. These cost 50 bucks a day to rent. Make sure it is minorly damp or it will not pack properly.
- Put in Snap Edge to border the area where the pad will be.
- Add ~1 inch sand. (Washed)
- Level with landscape rake or a long 1X4 board
- Lay stones
- Check to ensure your leveling job was good enough by examining the sidewalk, it is 100% easier to do this now than after you finish. Pull up and relevel any areas that are dipping etc.
- Sweep*dry* sand in between the cracks of the stones, use the plate compactor (no water) to help ensure it settles fully. You can use polymeric sand for this part, it had binder in it so it hardens solid after it gets wet. Make sure your sidewalk is perfect before you use this stuff, it is like murder getting stones out to fix it if something is wrong at this point.

Anyway, that is probably way more info than you were expecting. Feel free to ask if you have any questions.

I got all my product at Expocrete, or Ornamental Landscape (an Expocrete reseller). Their roman stones are by far the best in look of all we ever tried.

Edit: I just realized you were doing step as well. That could be done with a retaining wall, like Allen Block, Pisa. They make good steps 7-5/8 inch high with capstone on them. The back of the caps make a fantastic edge for the paving stones

That sounds like a lot of work, and that is why I'm considering to have someone do it for me.

What kind of ballpark $ do you think I would be looking at to have about a 25' walkway done from my front door, along the garage and to my driveway?

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by Table 5

Thanks Rathji, some great thoughts there. At first my parents were looking to use stamped concrete, but most of that stuff looks rather cheesy I think. I prefer the block/tile approach myself.

Do you have any recommendations for contractors to do this type of stuff?

I don't know of anyone personally. Been out of the business since 2006.

Originally Posted by Ironhorse

That sounds like a lot of work, and that is why I'm considering to have someone do it for me.

What kind of ballpark $ do you think I would be looking at to have about a 25' walkway done from my front door, along the garage and to my driveway?

Base min cost for most contractors will be twice material cost for a straightforward job with machine access. If you have a more complex job including existing landscaping to work around, expect that to go up. I haven't been landscaping since 2006, so things might have changed with the economy not supercharged.

Ornamental's Price List

25' walkway, 4 feet across that is totally straight would be 100 sq ft, plus about 20% for cutting = 120 sq ft.
4.7 blocks per sqft = 564 blocks, which is pretty much a pallet (560 pavers per pallet) which is about $500 plus delivery of about $75 for a total of about $575

Road crush is about $38 a yard.

100sq ft x 4 inches deep = 33 cubic feet, or about 1.25 cubic yards. (this math seems off to me for some reason), I wouldnt order less than 2 yards for this unless you had no way to dispose of extra gravel (like in your alley)

Sand is $65 a yard, and you would need 1 yard as well at minimum.

Factor in $75 each for those for delivery, but that might go down a little bit if you can split a load.

65+ 75 + 80+75 = $295

Edging material and spikes will be about $100.

575+295+100 = $970 for materials alone. Add in disposal and misc costs and machine time it would be about $1200.

So if you were paying someone, I would expect to pay about $2400 if they had easy access for machinery to dig out (and there were no utility concerns) and haul in materials. It would go up from there, especially for a larger company, since the smaller jobs are ones they would over bid on since they might not really want it for a price they might be willing to do a larger job for.

If it was me, and I was both as cheap as I am and being lazy, I would find some teenaged kid / cash corner reject to pay to dig it out and haul materials for me and then prep the area and lay the blocks myself.

edit: If spring comes around and this still needs done, I would probably be willing to do it for you over a weekend or two once school finishes. I really did love doing this stuff, but our business sense wasn't as good as our landscaping sense.