Widening driveway - advice please

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Hi All,
We currently have a single width driveway (tarmac) with grass to one side.
In a few weeks time I'm planning to make use of the easter weekend to widen it so we can park two cars side by side.
I plan to dig the grass, put in some base material, and then have concrete poured into the new area.

I have a few questions regarding this:

1) I'm going to hire a mini digger for the excavation, do I need to bother with hiring a whacker plate too, or can I drive the digger / use the bucket to compact the base layer?
2) Depths - since its a driveway, how deep should the dig be, and how deep for the base layer / concrete?
3) What material should be used for the base below the concrete?

(I will be getting the entire driveway covered with resin gravel - hence not bothered about the difference or concrete/tarmac)

Many thanks!
 
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1 yes you need a whacker
2 you need to remove all the top soil layer. As a minimum 150mm base layer and 100 concrete. If the ground is good, then 100mm base will do, if not good then it will need to be deeper
3 base can be crushed brick, scalping, or MOT 1

The problem you will have, is that you new section will settle and your resin coating will crack at the join.
 
Great thanks for the info guys.

Re: Planning permission, I understood that if the surface was porous (and concrete was) then it didn't require planning.

I assume I'd only need to contact planning when undertaking the resin part ?

I'm not doing the resin stuff straight away, so hopefully the new bit will have time to settle and won't crack!
 
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No, the new concrete slab will always move differently to the existing drive. It won't just settle and then stop moving. I probably should not have used 'settle'

Concrete is not permeable in this context. The requirements are that you design the hardstanding, not just the resin surface, so that no rain water goes into the public drains or onto the highway. Water needs to soak into the ground. You don't need to contact planning, just make sure that the drive is designed properly to do that.
 
OK thanks.
The drive currently slopes towards the house so if I didnt concrete right up to the house and created some gravelled / planting area at the edge of the drive then I should be fine?
The wording on the planning website seems to suggest you only need planning permission if the area is over 5m square AND isn't draining to a permiable surface.. So I'm assuming over 5m square that does drain to another surface doesn't need planning?
 
As woody says the resin bonded gravel will definately crack along the join. Best thing to do is make a feature out of it with a line of setts/ block pavers.

Be sure to check for services before going wild with a digger.
 

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