Fixing my driveway. Can anyone offer advice

It's too narrow and the center grass makes it difficult to use with a lowered car.

It wasn't quite this bad before the well drilling trucks visited my property. It's a "U" shaped driveway and the first picture is the side that is used the most. But it's Always been in need of some work. I was hoping there would be a grassroots way of me fixing this. Maybe renting a piece of equipment to widen and strip out the center grass strip. If that's not possible to DIY this project, what are my other options and who would do this as cheaply as possible? I do have a place for the material that is removed. I have some low spots that collect water as well as another issue with the neighbors runoff coming into my yard that probably requires another post. The top of the drive near the garage and house are pretty much flat but the gravel needs to be raked out to bring it to the top. I also have a small area next to the garage that I would like to dig out and throw some gravel in to widen my parking.

Any comments / suggestions would be appreciated.
 

It is a displacement/ drainage thing. If you can grade the areas on either side to allow the driveway to drain and dry it will support more weight. Then you can cap it with a few inches of fractured rock.  If you cannot lower or slope the sides you need to add enough depth of rock to get the driveway high enough to drain. You may be able to do a combination on various parts of the driveway. A well drained driveway with a solid base only needs a few inches of rock to support a car, but even occasional truck traffic needs more like a foot. Unless they come across only once or twice on a dry day. A couple trips by a dump truck will pound a lightly built driveway out in no time.

Before you add rock you would need to level it out and remove the organic layer.

I'm no road builder, but I'd guess it needs to be graded and topped with a few dump trucks worth of large gravel.

does the rain and runoff  drain into the road area ?

Just thinking that if the road is below the level and it fills with water that freezes you will have a hard time driving  in and out......

once you dig and put down a bed, place 6x6 or railroad ties at the edge to contain the gravel.

If building slows in the next few months, you may get a good deal on paving it.

Either way, you're going to need heavy equipment and expensive materials. Dozer, roller, crushed stone, and/or stabilization geogrid.

Let me know if you to discuss it further. 

californiamilleghia said:

does the rain and runoff  drain into the road area ?

Just thinking that if the road is below the level and it fills with water that freezes you will have a hard time driving  in and out......

There are catch basins at the street for driveway runoff. That's not the problem the center grass strip and the narrow drive are my problems. Every time the UPS truck comes in I end up with ditches in the grass.

My first thought was to rent a bobcat with the teeth on  the bucket. Widen and dig down and put landscape fabric down then gravel. Will this not work?
 

In reply to rustybugkiller :

I'm no paver or excavator, but your plan sounds reasonable to me. I'd guess that you'll probably want compaction at different stages too, or you're likely to end up in a similar position after awhile with the weight of vehicles pushing your rock into the ground. 

What Ive seen done successfully is excavation/grading, possibly followed by compacting the soil if it's not very firm. Then, baseball sized rock is put down and compacted into the ground for a sturdy base, then finer rock is added and compacted as the top layer.

In reply to rustybugkiller :

There is a product called geogrid that spreads the load and reduces the depth of rock you need. But it is expensive and a pain to work with. Fabric will not do the job.

I would scrape it level and maybe a few inches deeper, fill and roll with crush 'n run.  It will sink, next year add more crush 'n run, roll again.  You may have to do this four or five times.  My soil is clay, the driveway is >200 ft. long with 18" underneath it.  If your drive has a slope perpendicular to traffic direction, ask someone about running drain tubes under it all.

914Driver said:

I would scrape it level and maybe a few inches deeper, fill and roll with crush 'n run.  It will sink, next year add more crush 'n run, roll again.  You may have to do this four or five times.  My soil is clay, the driveway is >200 ft. long with 18" underneath it.  If your drive has a slope perpendicular to traffic direction, ask someone about running drain tubes under it all.

I have clay soil as well and this is pretty much what I was thinking. I'm hoping a Bobcat will work to scrape it deeper.

Can you explain drain tubes you mention? I have a very slight slope the the main side but with a catch basin at the edge of the drive and a slightly steeper slope on the other end w/o a catch basin.

Edit: almost looks like you have a slight slope or it's just the way the pic is taken

It drops a bit at the end, but pretty level left to right.  To keep water from eating away the bed, I was thinking a few 2" tubes under the driveway to give water a way by.

How long have you lived there? That driveway would drive me crazy. 
 

I'd do the scrape and crush and run suggested above at a minimum, it's quick and easy(ish)

Steve_Jones said:

How long have you lived there? That driveway would drive me crazy. 
 

I'd do the scrape and crush and run suggested above at a minimum, it's quick and easy(ish)

20  Years. Unfortunately, there has been a number of reasons why this has been let go.