Using concrete slabs to "pave" some wet spots in a road.

[HawkinsHollow]

I have a section of road in my bottom land that stays consistently wet and muddy. The ruts are about 6 to 8 inches deep, so not bottomless and I am never worried about getting my tractor stuck. But I would like to have the option of getting trucks down there. A truck would probably have to get on it pretty good to get through there making a mess of the road and truck.

Here is my plan. A buddy down the road got swindled into accepting some loads of fill that have tons of rather large concrete slab pieces about 4 to 6" thick. My plan is to run my york rake through the muck and mud to make a rather level bed for the concrete "tiles" and lay them together as close as possible to pave a road through the wet spots. I think the mud will almost act like mortar. I will fill the voids between the slabs with mid sized rock chunks to hold it all together. These sections are about 40' long and about 15' long, so not huge.

Any tips, tricks, warnings? Good idea bad idea?

 

[Clintock]

Couldn’t see where it’d hurt one bit. Wish I had some of those concrete slabs to do the same thing

 

[JasperFrank]

If the sections are wet all year long, you are trying to build over spring areas. With no base for your "pavers" they are just going to sink and flip on you and possibly make the road a confused mess of tilted chunks of concrete. I think you'll need to at least lay down some 2-3 inch clear rock, then do your pavers, then top with 1/4 minus.

 

[Topzide]

Run some drain tile, some sort of crushed fill then slabs. That way the water has a place to go. JM2C

 

[Egon]

It will work And quite well. Good plan!

 

[HawkinsHollow]

Thank you for the responses gentlemen!!

It isn't a spring, just a low spot that holds water and has been driven over enough to make a mess. I do have an option to run a culvert before the section to divert water away from it a bit. The water does have a way out now, this spot is just a little lower so it stays wet. It will probably be good to channelize the water a bit better before laying slabs. When I raise it and fill it with the concrete slabs the majority of the water will go out that way. I do think putting a bit of a base down COULD help but I wonder if it is necessary. That stuff is expensive now a days might just be like throwing money into the mud. I have been trying this with smaller bricks and broken up cinder blocks for a while and they have made a bottom to the muck. I do think the slabs will be pretty stable once in place. I am talking slabs in the range of 18" x24" or greater. They are going to have a pretty good footprint and should be able to handle a decent load.

 

[Clintock]

I work with the county in rural America. We use rip rap to fill in soft spots in some of our roads then cap it with pit run. Mind you the ground here is rotten. No good dirt for miles. Concrete chunks.. same concept as rip rap. It WILL work. The concrete will help tighten the hole. Same as aggregate. Ifn it was me and I had access to the chunks you’re describing I’d have several holes filled in by now.

 

[ROUSTABOUT]

There is a reason brick streets are five layers thick.

 

[seville009]

Maybe smash up some of the concrete first (with a sledge hammer) to use that as the base to then lay some of the slabs on

 

[HawkinsHollow]

Maybe smash up some of the concrete first (with a sledge hammer) to use that as the base to then lay some of the slabs on

Good idea! I have already done this to an extent over the last year or 2, but only mostly in the ruts. I think that is why the mud never gets too deep. I have some only busted up bricks and cinder blocks laying around that I will use fo that.

 

[4570Man]

If they’re fairly uniform slabs that you can fit together and make a decent road it might work but it sounds more like a mess to me.

 

[Jstpssng]

I’m trying to figure out which is 15 and 40 feet long, the wet areas or the slabs of concrete? If the latter, I don’t see how it can hurt; especially if you fill underneath them first as others have suggested. Somewhere recently I’ve seen slabs of concrete from a bridge for sale. The only question I have in both instances is how do you set them?

 

[bcp]

If you have enough concrete slabs, lay them in two, three, or more layers, alternating joints, like bricks in a wall.

Bruce

 

[JasperFrank]

Don't include me in the negative Nancy catagory. Just saye'en been there on a seemingly insolvable road, that just was a waste of time, as people did try to do it on the cheap. And it never worked cause the road was over a spring with clay as a base soil with no real other rock base set down. Heavy trucks would just blow the whole thing out, with one run. You need at least something under those pavers, to keep them from tilting.

 

[ROUSTABOUT]

This wouldn't be a TBN post if there wasn't at least 1 or 2 negative Nancy posts. I will let you all know how it goes.

You can negative nancyvall you want. I clean out chicken houses among other things I do. I know all about the pile of busted concrete over yonder and the wet ground over here to get in the chicken houses. I was on a tracked skid steer which makes things a little better. But you can't get a tractor over it at all. Go ahead and bury a truck. Ain't nothing like spending a couple of days getting a dump truck out.

 

[MasseyFerg231]

You may get lucky, but roads/parking lots are a lot like computers: garbage in=garbage out.

if you get rid of the water first, it should dry on its on.

 

[Fuddy1952]

Why not try it in stages? Take a few concrete slabs placing them in the middle wet spot seeing how they do. That way you'll know how they react, stay or shift or tip.
I'm thinking step one would be trying to get water diverged by ditches would be best. Then concrete, rip rap going up to #57 gravel.
Depending on how wet, how deep that area is will determine how just putting concrete slabs on it reacts. A few inches of wet mud over firm ground is different than a few feet deep of swampy muck.

 

[Egon]

I believe the OP stated eight inch or so ruts on a stable bottom.

That’s not the bottomless swamp scenario that keeps getting quoted!

 

[pacosperson]

I have a section of road in my bottom land that stays consistently wet and muddy. The ruts are about 6 to 8 inches deep, so not bottomless and I am never worried about getting my tractor stuck. But I would like to have the option of getting trucks down there. A truck would probably have to get on it pretty good to get through there making a mess of the road and truck.

Here is my plan. A buddy down the road got swindled into accepting some loads of fill that have tons of rather large concrete slab pieces about 4 to 6" thick. My plan is to run my york rake through the muck and mud to make a rather level bed for the concrete "tiles" and lay them together as close as possible to pave a road through the wet spots. I think the mud will almost act like mortar. I will fill the voids between the slabs with mid sized rock chunks to hold it all together. These sections are about 40' long and about 15' long, so not huge.

Any tips, tricks, warnings? Good idea bad idea?

I fought similar problems for years, attempting similar solutions. It dawned on me that every road I drove on had water run under it in pipes of various sizes. So I took that route and started controlling the water. It was more work but did eliminate 98% of my problems. Others have come to see what I had done. My default statement is; 'Stop using your driveway as a drainage ditch'.

 

[HawkinsHollow]

I fought similar problems for years, attempting similar solutions. It dawned on me that every road I drove on had water run under it in pipes of various sizes. So I took that route and started controlling the water. It was more work but did eliminate 98% of my problems. Others have come to see what I had done. My default statement is; 'Stop using your driveway as a drainage ditch'.

Excellent advice! Makes perfect sense.
The only problem is this area is along a creek and it floods 3-8 times a year. So unless I raise that area somehow it will always get wet and stay wet for awhile, generally most of the winter and spring.