CrankyOne

We have a long (1400’ / 420 meters) driveway that we are having to get repaved. It has near complete tree coverage so gets only limited sun, particularly in winter. We get about 50-90” of snow per year and winters are quite cold so snow and ice tend to stick around.

We usually have studs (Marathon Winter) on front tyres only which has largely been sufficient (paths get a lot of sun so stay clear enough that this works).

Thanks to tire ruts on the old drive we had a high spot running down the middle that would often remain fairly clear of snow to ride on. This both thanks to the snow plow scraping it and limited sun helping out.

Typically a new driveway here would be flat and level which raises concerns that we will not have a strip clear of snow/ice to ride on.

We can crown the drive which should work except that it costs more to do that and since plow blades are flat makes it more difficult to clear the driveway of snow.

Another option is to slope or pitch the drive a bit. Two concerns with this are; when snow on the high side melts it will flow across the drive and freeze, and if it’s sloped too much it could be more dangerous through ice patches than a flat drive with more ice patches.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

Notso_fastLane

I would go with a slight slope. Probably .05 - 1%. That should be plenty to allow melting snow to run off, but it won't really do it all. There's always a balance point where it's not worth it to go much higher, but at least if it's just sloped, it would be easier to plow.