Belmont paving contractor
Yes, we lay pavers all over Belmont
Belmont is our neighbor. The town line is a few blocks north of our shop on El Camino Real, so a Belmont job is a short drive with no freeway in it at all. That sounds like a small thing until you are the one waiting on a second load of base rock at three in the afternoon.
What makes Belmont its own kind of work is the ground. The flat part of town near US 101 is only a narrow strip. Almost everything west of El Camino Real and Alameda de las Pulgas climbs, and it keeps climbing toward Interstate 280 and the ridge behind it. Houses up there sit on benches cut into the slope, with driveways that run at a real grade and yards that step down in levels. The crew that works out of San Carlos builds on that kind of lot all the time, and most Belmont calls end up being a paver driveway built for a grade plus whatever is holding the ground up beside it.
What makes a Belmont job different
Water. On a flat lot, water is something you pitch away from the house and forget. On a Belmont hillside, every drop that lands above your house is trying to get past it, and a driveway laid across that path becomes the drain whether you planned it that way or not. So we start at the top of the site and work down: where the water arrives, where it has to go, and what the paving has to do in between. That usually means a real fall built into the surface, a trench drain across the apron before the garage, and an outlet that carries it to the street rather than into the neighbor below.
The second thing is the slope itself. A driveway on a grade wants to creep downhill over time, so the base goes in deeper, it gets compacted in layers instead of all at once, and the edge restraint at the bottom has to be set properly or the whole field slowly walks. Where the ground has to be held back, that is a segmental block or stone faced wall with drainage rock and fabric behind it, not a wall with dirt pushed up against its back. And where levels change, paver steps keep the rise and run even the whole way up. Come and look at a job with us, or call and get us out to look at the grade, and we will walk the slope with you.
What we handle here
What we build in Belmont
Driveway Paving
The common Belmont call is a drive that climbs, cracks across the middle and holds water at the bottom where it meets the street. We take the old surface out, rebuild the base deeper than a flat lot needs and compact it in layers, then lay the pavers with the fall built in so rain leaves before it soaks down. Our paver driveway work in Belmont is sized to the grade, not to a standard detail.
Retaining Wall Construction
Half the usable yard in the hills is usable because a wall is holding the slope. We build segmental block and stone faced walls on a compacted base, with drainage stone and fabric behind them and the courses stepped back so the wall leans into the hill. We are an Allan Block Certified Installer, which matters most on the taller ones. See how we approach retaining wall construction before you pick a height.
Outdoor Steps
Belmont front yards often drop several feet from the door to the street, and the steps that came with the house are usually uneven, which is exactly what people trip on. We set every rise and run the same the whole way up, build the steps into the slope rather than sitting them on top of it, and tie them into the walkway at both ends. Our outdoor step builds use the same pavers or brick as the surface they join.
Drainage Solutions for Driveways
Standing water is what ruins a driveway, and on a hill it arrives from uphill as well as from the sky. We put in trench drains across the apron, catch basins at the low points and a graded fall through the paving itself, then run it out to the street. Our driveway drainage work goes in with the base, under the pavers, which is the only time it is easy to do.
Why Belmont calls us
Why Belmont homeowners call Exterior Designs
Because we are down the road, not passing through. Exterior Pavers Designs is family owned and operated out of 542 El Camino Real in San Carlos, a few minutes south of the Belmont line. Todd Chandler runs the crew and is on the job, so the person who measures your driveway and talks you through the grade is the person who builds it. There is one phone number and it reaches us.
The certifications matter more than usual on a hillside. Todd is an ICPI Certified Paver Installer and a Belgard Master Craftsman, and we are an Allan Block Certified Installer, which is the piece that counts when a wall is holding a slope above your house. Every installation is built to ICPI specification and carries a 20 year warranty, and we only work in interlocking pavers and natural stone. Estimates are free, so if you are not sure whether you need paving, a retaining wall or both, have us come and look.
Where you will see us around Belmont
Belmont is stacked between the bay and the ridge, and every road through it tells you something about the ground. US 101 runs along the flat eastern edge. El Camino Real and the Caltrain line sit a little higher, on the old bench above the flats. Alameda de las Pulgas runs higher again, and west of it the streets start to climb in earnest toward Interstate 280 and the Skyline ridge behind it. We come up El Camino Real from San Carlos, so we are in town before most crews have cleared the freeway.
Above that bench the lots are cut and filled, the creeks run down through the canyons between the ridges, and winter rain moves fast because it has somewhere to go. That is why so much of our Belmont work is a driveway and a wall in the same job, or steps and a walkway rebuilt together so the levels finally agree. Down on the flatter streets near the freeway the story changes to clay and standing water, and the answer there is base depth and proper drainage rather than more wall.
Where we work
Paver work we build in Belmont
We cover every part of Belmont, from the flat streets near US 101 up to the ones under Interstate 280, and we are on the same run most weeks for our San Mateo customers to the north and the neighborhoods around Redwood City to the south.
Ask a paver installer
Straight answers about paver installation on the Peninsula
Do you actually come out to Belmont?
Constantly. Belmont is the next town north of our shop on El Camino Real in San Carlos, so it is one of the shortest runs we make. There is no travel charge to come and look at your job.
Can pavers be laid on a steep Belmont driveway?
Yes, and they hold up better than most people expect. The work is in the base: it goes in deeper, it gets compacted in layers, and the edge restraint at the bottom is set so the field cannot creep downhill. We also build the fall in so water runs off instead of sitting on it.
My driveway floods at the garage every winter. Can that be fixed?
Usually, and on a Belmont hillside it is almost always a grading problem rather than a paving problem. We look at where the water is coming from first, then set a trench drain across the apron and a fall through the paving that carries it out to the street. The drainage goes in with the base, before a single paver is laid.
How tall a retaining wall can you build?
It depends on the slope above it, what is loading the top of it and what Belmont wants to see. We are an Allan Block Certified Installer and we build segmental walls with proper drainage behind them. If a wall needs an engineer, we will tell you that at the estimate rather than after.
Do you pour concrete steps or a concrete drive?
No. We only work in interlocking pavers and natural stone. On a hillside that is an advantage: if the ground ever moves, a paver surface can be lifted and reset in the same afternoon, and a slab has to be broken out.
How long does a Belmont driveway take?
Most homes are a few days on site once we start, longer where there is base repair, a wall or drainage work in the same job. Rain moves it, because we will not compact a base that is saturated. Every installation is built to ICPI specification and carries our 20 year warranty.