Hopefully you can see my site plan I've attached. It should be in my profile as well. This is a design for a 2 long narrow apartment buildings in northern Wisconsin separated by a 30' wide driveway. The curved part is a 7% grade, the straight part is 3% grade down to retention pond. Business partner doesn't want to move the 3 visitor parking spots to the north or south, says plow guys are used to cars in there way. Business partner doesn't want to install driveway heat on steep part, says to expensive. My concerns are I don't want to have to have plow guy (yet to be hired) come out multiple times cause tenants get stuck on the steep curvy part, and I don't want to have to tell tenants they can't park in the 3 visitor spots during snow (cause people will park there anyways). Thoughts? Questions? I want to heat steep part (2, 3' wide sections just for tires) and move parking spots on east side. Way too expensive to do electric heat the whole driveway. Salt/sand doesn't do that well of a job in subzero temps right, on steep grade?
Cars in the way in apartment buildings is always a issue. As far as the grades have your snow and ice guy stay on it like every inch or so a long with spreading. If you don't have hard pack should not be a issue.
To heat the grades would be a expensive venture. Get a reputable snow and ice guy for the season and be done with it. Good Luck.
I agree, and will only add (because this looks very similar to a couple of sites we do) that the degree of difficulty will have a direct bearing on the cost to perform service. So perhaps a dollar spent now will save two in the long run.
The problem with the heated road is if the crown in the road is not greater than the grade (7%) the water could just run down the road and refreeze in the road instead of going to the side of the road.
Thanks for the replies, the 2 spurs, they call it a hammerhead in road design lingo, is for the fire truck turn around, they need all that space. There's only about 12'-15' from the top and bottom of the hammerhead to the property line so we could extend the hammerhead right to the property lines, but it wouldn't actually be enough room for a genuine parking space so the fire dept might not like that especially if they find out about it later. Inside the curvy part of the hammerhead would be where I'd want to add 2 spots. You're right a reputable snow and ice guy can do this no problem for a price, but moving those parking spots will make things easier and little cheaper for everyone. Good point, the steep heated curvy part doesn't sound like the greatest idea anymore, where the slope changes and the heat stops it'll just be a big ice dam until the plow guy shows.
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