Concrete Driveways in Weston, MO

A concrete driveway holds up in Weston when it is built for the loess that caps these Missouri River bluffs: a proof-rolled, compacted subgrade, a granular base that drains, four-plus inches of 4,000-PSI concrete, and control joints saw-cut on time. Loess is wind-blown silt that carries a slab when packed tight and washes out when it is not.

Weston sits on the bluffs above the river, and the loess soil under its historic streets behaves differently from the clay most of the metro sits on. It stands up well when it stays dry and packed, but let water run into it and it erodes and collapses, dropping whatever sits on top. On these narrow historic lots we compact the subgrade and grade so water leaves the slab instead of soaking the silt beneath it. If a drive is only cracking at one edge, our concrete repair can hold it, but a slab that has dropped or eroded at the edges usually earns a fresh driveway on a drainage-first base.

Weston's Main Street district and the streets around McCormick Distilling are full of century-old homes on narrow lots, and many of their drives were poured decades ago on a thin base over loess. No patch fixes a slab that has dropped or broken up on eroding silt. When a driveway rocks, holds water, or has cracked into pieces, a repour on a compacted, draining base outlasts more filler.

We tear out the old concrete, dig back washed or soft silt, rebuild the base, and reset the grade so the new slab drains. On these tight historic lots we work carefully around the character of the street. Ford pours the same driveways in nearby Platte City and across the river in Leavenworth, which sits on the same kind of loess. Our driveway replacement guide covers when a repour beats a repair.

A same-footprint replacement is usually simple, but a new approach onto a public street, a widening, or right-of-way work needs a permit from the City of Weston, and a rural or bluff-road approach may fall under Platte County. In the historic district there may be added review, which we handle. We pull the right one, build the approach to grade, and schedule the inspection. Missouri stormwater runs through MoDNR, not Kansas's KDHE.

The permit is part of the job. Planning more than a driveway on a historic lot? Our Weston services page lays out drives, patios, and repair together, and for a bluff grade our retaining walls hold the slope. See finished work on the project gallery.