Sticker shock on having a new road built

[Upstate Nerdneck]

We had a long time friend of the family come by and give us an estimate on building a real road in to the current cabin (shack).  631 yards of road, so roughly 1900 feet.  Somewhere between 30k-35k.  That's for a foot of shale, a couple of culverts and some light grading in a few places.  I was figuring 25k'ish.  I'll do due diligence and get another estimate, but I highly doubt it will get any cheaper than that.

 

Youch.

[mowin]

9 minutes ago, Upstate Nerdneck said:

We had a long time friend of the family come by and give us an estimate on building a real road in to the current cabin (shack).  631 yards of road, so roughly 1900 feet.  Somewhere between 30k-35k.  That's for a foot of shale, a couple of culverts and some light grading in a few places.  I was figuring 25k'ish.  I'll do due diligence and get another estimate, but I highly doubt it will get any cheaper than that.

 

Youch.

That's a long road.  I think his price is fair. 

[Keith Nehrke]

We put down stone on 200 yards of existing lane with a single culvert last year, but did the compacting ourselves. Grading was via the slinger from the truck, the operator was a genius and we ended up with a level dance platform next to marsh and pond, without much raking required. It took five full loads from the stone slinger conveyor truck  (110 yards?) to complete. The cost for stone - #3 crusher if I recall correctly - and operator's time was ~$2K.  The rest of the road is on a slight grade, enough so that it drains well and doesn't need to be stone. I can't imagine my wife's eyes if I told her we were going to spend twice as much on our single lane access road as we did paving our fairly long driveway two years ago. 

[Spaceman Spiff]

Thats not unrealistic. Prices on everything are just crazy. 

[G-man]

23 hours ago, Upstate Nerdneck said:

We had a long time friend of the family come by and give us an estimate on building a real road in to the current cabin (shack).  631 yards of road, so roughly 1900 feet.  Somewhere between 30k-35k.  That's for a foot of shale, a couple of culverts and some light grading in a few places.  I was figuring 25k'ish.  I'll do due diligence and get another estimate, but I highly doubt it will get any cheaper than that.

 

Youch.

Rent a dozer to do work yourself

  A bunch of  tandem axle trailers of 3  in for base then  top with 1 and 2s.  Dozer here is 750.00 for the weekend  plus fuel ( unless you return full  which is cheaper  if you can find off road and have transfer tanks or  lot of cans. 

Culverts can be purchased 20 ft  long and cut to 10 ft  easily with sawzall if  pvc.  

I would bet your into it for  5 to 8 doing yourself

[Upstate Nerdneck]

2 hours ago, G-man said:

Rent a dozer to do work yourself

  A bunch of  tandem axle trailers of 3  in for base then  top with 1 and 2s.  Dozer here is 750.00 for the weekend  plus fuel ( unless you return full  which is cheaper  if you can find off road and have transfer tanks or  lot of cans. 

Culverts can be purchased 20 ft  long and cut to 10 ft  easily with sawzall if  pvc.  

I would bet your into it for  5 to 8 doing yourself

I am seriously considering it.  One of things in that 30-35 is when they build the road over one of the wetter sections, they're going to build it up and scoop a little pond out in front of the cabin.  It's what my dad wants, really bad.

Shale ain't cheap though.  300$ a dump load here.  I like where' your head is at, but time is my rarest commodity right now.  Split 3 ways, 30-35 ain't too bad.  

[G-man]

35 minutes ago, Upstate Nerdneck said:

I am seriously considering it.  One of things in that 30-35 is when they build the road over one of the wetter sections, they're going to build it up and scoop a little pond out in front of the cabin.  It's what my dad wants, really bad.

Shale ain't cheap though.  300$ a dump load here.  I like where' your head is at, but time is my rarest commodity right now.  Split 3 ways, 30-35 ain't too bad.  

Im putting in a 1/4 acre pons and doing 700  ft roadway in and culvert at my place last weekend in april  . Rented dozer . Will have it all  done  in 2 days ( dozer work) as well as fixing a few logging roads ..  todays machines are easy to operate and can move dirt  in a hurry.  Yes i get up early and work till  dark  but  my time used wisly vs spending a months  or more salary to  have someone else do it. 

[2BuckBizCT]

Seems super cheap for that much length, 631 yards!

my driveway was redone (115 yards out of the full 165 yards) last year by prior owner. He left me the receipt. It was $20K for 3” thick. 

[Upstate Nerdneck]

1 hour ago, 2BuckBizCT said:

Seems super cheap for that much length, 631 yards!

my driveway was redone (115 yards out of the full 165 yards) last year by prior owner. He left me the receipt. It was $20K for 3” thick. 

I'm doing shale, big difference.  Though we got quoted to do our paved 100 yard drive 6500 last year.  Fun prices down your way!

[Phantom]

About 5 years ago Cost me 4000 just to patch all the bad spots on my drive way and parking lot 150 long and then parking area opens  up to 150×150 so yea 30ish k for what you need to do sounds around what they would ask .  

[Upstate Nerdneck]

20 hours ago, G-man said:

Im putting in a 1/4 acre pons and doing 700  ft roadway in and culvert at my place last weekend in april  . Rented dozer . Will have it all  done  in 2 days ( dozer work) as well as fixing a few logging roads ..  todays machines are easy to operate and can move dirt  in a hurry.  Yes i get up early and work till  dark  but  my time used wisly vs spending a months  or more salary to  have someone else do it. 

Really starting to lean in this direction.  Rent a dozer.  Dig down 6", lay a barrier down, shale it.  Bring in an excavator to do those parts + build a little pond to make my dad happy.

[Spaceman Spiff]

1 hour ago, Upstate Nerdneck said:

Really starting to lean in this direction.  Rent a dozer.  Dig down 6", lay a barrier down, shale it.  Bring in an excavator to do those parts + build a little pond to make my dad happy.

Biggest issue with doing it yourself is getting all the pitches right. Dont want big wet spots. 

[The Back 40]

I love doing projects myself and I can operate a lot of different equipment BUT most professional operators are going to get the work done twice if not three times as fast as a DIYer would. My company rents a lot of equipment and even though the rental cost is $X per day many times the delivery and pickup cost can be $250-$500 each way depending on the size of the equipment and the distance plus fuel, and they use a lot of fuel. Plus, many of the rental places base their rental rates on an 8hr. day. So, if you run the machine for 12 hours for two days (24hrs.) they may charge you for a 3-day rental.

The other consideration is how many pieces of equipment you made need. If you have to cut out 12" for your base for 1900' that leaves you over 840 yds of material and if you cannot spread out your spoils, you will need some form of loader and possibly a dump truck. The culverts may require a mini-ex to dig and place. so now you are up to four different pieces of equipment and only one operator. 

One thing I learned as a construction project manager is that people always underestimate the time it will take to complete a task, which is why "weekend" projects end up taking a month.

[Lawdwaz]

3 hours ago, The Back 40 said:

I love doing projects myself and I can operate a lot of different equipment BUT most professional operators are going to get the work done twice if not three times as fast as a DIYer would. My company rents a lot of equipment and even though the rental cost is $X per day many times the delivery and pickup cost can be $250-$500 each way depending on the size of the equipment and the distance plus fuel, and they use a lot of fuel. Plus, many of the rental places base their rental rates on an 8hr. day. So, if you run the machine for 12 hours for two days (24hrs.) they may charge you for a 3-day rental.

The other consideration is how many pieces of equipment you made need. If you have to cut out 12" for your base for 1900' that leaves you over 840 yds of material and if you cannot spread out your spoils, you will need some form of loader and possibly a dump truck. The culverts may require a mini-ex to dig and place. so now you are up to four different pieces of equipment and only one operator. 

One thing I learned as a construction project manager is that people always underestimate the time it will take to complete a task, which is why "weekend" projects end up taking a month.

Sounds like common sense to me.   Thanks for adding it to the conversation.