Driveways can be tough to manage. Depending on what type of driveway you have, how it’s shaped, where it’s located, and what it’s made out of, you might have to invest a significant amount of time and energy into maintaining your driveway.
Driveways on a steep slope, for instance, come with their own unique set of problems and challenges. Steeply sloped driveways are sometimes unavoidable, or even desirable, despite the problems they can present.
In case you’re looking to build or renovate a driveway on a steep slope, let’s take a look at some of the best steep driveway options out there and see how they stack up against each other.
What Makes Steeply Sloped Driveways Unique?
Steep driveway surfaces are known for being much harder to manage than regular driveways. This is mostly due to erosion and the shifting of the subsurface beneath the driveway’s surface.
For starters, stormwater tends to cascade down a steep driveway, running along the sides of it and creating deep crevices through the process of erosion. These crevices can be dangerous if you accidentally step into them or drive into them. They can lead to ankle injuries, as well as suspension and axle damage to your vehicle.
Shifting of the entire driveway or even collapse in certain areas is also possible if erosion reaches all the way underneath your steep driveway. This is most common with materials like asphalt and concrete, which tend to be laid in solid pieces over the surface of the soil. They are not typically anchored to the subsurface in any way, which leaves them especially vulnerable to shifting and erosion on a slope.
Damage, or wear and tear, to the surface of materials like asphalt and concrete can also lead to water intrusion and subsurface damage to your driveway, made all the worse by its location on a slope.
The effect that gravity has on water once it reaches the subsurface of your driveway exacerbates the effects of normal erosion, leading to a driveway that can become completely compromised in a fraction of the time a level driveway would have.
This makes the need for resealing more frequent, costing you more. It also may require you to install some sort of drainage or protection on the sides of your driveway as well.