Gravel driveway & French drain questions

[jbett98]

As far as French Drains go, the trench is usually 4' deep by 4' wide and however long it needs to be depending on how much the sq. ft. roof area it is collecting.
I wouldn't locate a driveway over the French drain, as it's filled with drain rock and that type of rock never settles or compacts.
To keep costs down, you can install them as parallel runway lanes instead of a full width driveway.

 

[doninoregon]

A French drain should use river rock because the round stones allow water flow.

The cost of delivered gravel depends mostly on the distance it's hauled from.

When I have gravel delivered to dress my driveway, the guy spreads it pretty evenly but I still go over it with my tractor to smooth it out. This is done by "back blading" ie dragging backwards with the loader bucket tilted down so the lip of the bucket acts as a grader blade. You fine tune the height by tilting the bucket, not raising or lowering it. Or you can use a grader blade if you have one.

A concrete driveway will stand up to heavy trucks if it's sized right but of course thicker costs more.