Design criteria for concrete driveways & sidewalks

[Doug3las]

Where can I find the recommended thickness of unreinforced concrete, at various strengths, required to construct driveways and sidewalks for various axle loads and soil conditions?

 

[Focht3]

Check out the AASHTO pavement design guidelines -

In general, I don't like to use unreinforced concrete, even for decorative flatwork. Why don't you want steel in the paving?

 

[ARVY]

I think it was economy reason. Cause in the pure compresed situation of concrete, steel bar was unnecessary. Especially while the cracking dose not affect the function of concrete like the curb and sidewalk pavement.
How do u thing about it?

 

[boo1]

We allways like to use steel. Driveways get #3 edge reinforcement, 6x6-10, wire and fiber . Sidewalks get wire and fiber. Curbs get 2 or 3 - #3.

 

[Focht3]

Steel is still pretty cheap - compared to the overall cost. And it has lots of benefits, too.

 

[gtrainor]

We have a client that begs us not use steel even in the landing zones of heavy aircraft. In lieu of steel, we thicken the concrete about 20% more. Of course this goes through several calulations and is not a random guess thickness. But the reason the client hates steel is that it is more expensive to install and the service life is same, and demolition is half the costs since there is no steel to deal with. You might consider fiber mesh for driveways. We use fibermesh in many cases and are really amazed how well it holds up.

 

[Zambo]

side walks and driveways could be considered separately. For sidewalks what about 50mm (2&quot thick precast concrete paving slabs, no rebar needed. Kerbs also reinforcement can be omitted. For driveways I would have thought steel mesh a worthwhile extra cost.

For thicknesses there must be a lot of information available for ground bearing slabs and as suggested AASHTO pavement design guidelines are a good start.

Zambo