RV Access on my side yard - what to install for the ground underneath???

[Ride Everything]

Hi All - first time here, hope to be back a lot in the future!

Question:  I'm creating RV access on my side yard.  The retaining wall is built, and now I'm ready for the ground cover - which is currently dirt.  I'm looking for the cheapest, best-looking ground cover.  Obviously I could pour concrete, but with the crazy cost of concrete nowadays, I was hoping for an alternative.

These are some ideas I have so far:  concrete, pavers, pebble stone, concrete strips for the wheels with pebbles in between, and I've even been thinking about artificial turf??

Any suggestions?  Pictures would even be better.  Any help would be great because this has been a very expensive project and I'm very close to running out of cash. 

Oh yeah, I'm looking to cover ground that's approximately 14' x 80'.

Thanks!

 

[Tom]

Baserock (crushed stone) works well on its own or as a base for concrete, however it's not nice to look at.

At our last house, I poured concrete over baserock in the side yard and put decorative stones over baserock in the front yard leading to the side gate. The stones were chosen to be appropriate for the rest of our front landscape.

At an earlier house I poured a pair of concrete strips with grass in between, but they still looked like concrete.

A good choice I've seen (but not used) are concrete blocks that have large holes in them, allowing grass to grow through the holes. Keeping the grass a little long when mowing hides the concrete blocks. I've seen something similar with railroad ties, but they're harder to hide.

 

[Carl L]

One possibility, if you can do the labor, is edge set common brick in sand.? ? If things are really tight, pea gravel back filled about 6" in the ground.? ?

 

[John From Detroit]

I used gravel (What you call pebble stone) for my RV parking pad.

 

[Shayne]

On our large pad that we had for several RV's and other vehicles  A 3" layer of 1 1/2" rock  about 3" of 3/4" stone and capped off with powdered limestone.  We then wet it and rolled it several times till it became quite hard.  This was in the midwest near St Louis and the thawing and frost  lines never bothered it.  Spray it for weeds couple times a year. Worked great.

 

[Tom]

Shayne,

Good point re the need to be aware of local conditions when deciding what to put down.

 

[Wendy]

We built retaining walls, laid down black plastic between the walls, and covered that with 3" of gravel. We're thinking about adding another inch or 2 of gravel. Mike just finished making concrete pads where the wheels park....decided we couldn't afford a full concrete pad or lanes. We also poured a 10" wide strip of concrete under the gate....keeps the skunks out and the dog in. I'll see if Mike can take a couple of pictures and post them.

 

[Ride Everything]

Thanks for all the tips everyone, I appreciate it. 

The black plastic gives me an idea.  I was wondering if I'd be able to lay down some plastic over packed dirt, then lay AstroTurf  on top of that.  If I made sure the drainage was OK, do you think this would work.  I'll probably go with concrete in the very front yard, and the AstroTurf would essentially be under the trailer...

Thoughts??

 

[rovinsteve]

Not sure about astroturf but using "filter fabric" under 3/4"-0 crushed rock works well.  If the soil is clay, the filter fabric keeps the clay from pushing up through the rock and retains a stable surface while allowing water to pass through.  Wetting and rolling the rock layer will make a good hard surface.

--Steve

 

[Wendy]

The black plastic over dirt works good here with gravel on top of it. Drains fine. Gets a little mushy on the downslope side between the gravel and plastic when the snow melts but nothing that's caused any problems or stopped us from getting in or out. The AstroTurf might shift where the gravel doesn't go anywhere.

 

[caltex]

I used 12 inches of crushed rock as a base and then put 3-4 inches of dirt on top.  Have grass over the dirt and everything works as planned.  When the RV is not there it just looks like lawn.  Even when it rains the RV won't sink into the the base.

Downside is that when the RV is on the pad, you can't mow the grass under it and the lawn sprinklers tend to water spot the RV.

 

[Ride Everything]

Does anyone have pictures of a pebble stone RV access drive they can post up?  Thanks!

 

[Dave R]

We just used crusher run stone and let the grass grow over it. A fried of mine did the same where he parked the school bus some years ago.

Dave