Concrete driveways, Newcastle

Concrete driveways in Mayfield

Steelworkers' streets laid out over the grounds of Victorian villas, where the driveway is narrow, old and hemmed in by the house, and replacing it is the job.

Driveways in Mayfield, 2304

Mayfield lies about 6 km north west of the Newcastle CBD, between the Maitland Road shopping strip and Industrial Drive on the river side, where the last of the 1868 Botanic Reserve survives at the end of Crebert Street. John Scholey subdivided his land in 1888 and named it after his daughter, and for a while this was the Toorak of Newcastle, with villas on large grounds along the ridge lines. The steelworks opened in 1915 and changed everything. Housing for workers went up in a rush, the villa grounds were cut into cheaper lots, Lysaghts built about a hundred houses for migrant steelworkers in the 1920s, and the soap works land was subdivided in the 1930s. Nearly three quarters of dwellings are still separate houses on those lots, so the driveway work is replacement, on narrow frontages.

A ridge over the river flats

Council’s heritage walk describes the original landscape as swampy ground overlooked by a ridge line, with creeks across the low land by the estuary, since filled; both walks warn of hilly terrain. A Mayfield driveway is therefore either a ridge job with a fall to manage or a flat job on made ground where the base matters. Most of Mayfield sits outside any mine subsidence district. The exception is a small pocket at the Tighes Hill end, next to Mayfield East, and even there the district bears on a garage rather than a driveway, since Subsidence Advisory NSW exempts driveways and hard stand spaces under all its guidelines except 4 and 5; the NSW Planning Portal Spatial Viewer settles a lot on that side.

Old concrete on narrow lots

A workers’ cottage from the 1920s has a driveway that was an afterthought, a pair of strips or a thin slab squeezed down one side of the house, and by now it has cracked or sunk. Removal and replacement is the core job, and because the streets are narrow and the side gap is tight the pour is usually by pump, with the side path and the back slab done on the same day. The villa grounds are still being split, twelve units having gone into the grounds of Bella Vista, so a shared driveway in plain concrete for a dual occupancy or a small unit block is the second stream. Newcastle itself, down Maitland Road, is where the lots get tighter still.

The crossing on a Mayfield frontage

City of Newcastle approves a new, widened or replaced crossing through a Section 138 (Type 1) application, and its drawing A1300 gives a single residential crossing 2.5 to 3.0 metres wide, which most Mayfield frontages will take. Where a stormwater pipe has to run through the verge to the kerb, the road opening permit sits on the same form. The Section 138 guide sets out what to lodge and when.

Finishes for a cottage frontage

A weatherboard or Federation cottage on a narrow lot carries a plain broom driveway well. Exposed aggregate suits the renovated fronts on the ridge streets, and coloured concrete the courtyard behind. Council may consider a coloured or exposed finish on the crossing, but its drawing’s default is plain broom and stamped concrete is not permitted there at all.

Mayfield rates per square metre

Supplied and laid: patios and alfresco $100 to $180; coloured concrete $115 to $160; exposed aggregate $130 to $185; plain $95 to $130; removal of the old driveway adds about $35; paths $90 to $130; shed and garage slabs $110 to $150. In Mayfield it is access that moves the figure, because a long thin driveway down the side of a cottage on a narrow street is a pump pour. Price it in the calculator and read the cost guide; the specification says what a quote should include, and the Section 138 guide what council will ask for.

Before the crossing is poured

The strip from your front boundary to the kerb needs City of Newcastle's Section 138 (Type 1) approval before it is poured, whether the driveway is new, wider than before or a replacement. Council's drawing A1300 fixes the width, the 100 mm thickness and the plain broom finish on that strip. What happens inside the boundary is your call.

The application, step by step

Straight answers

Asked in Mayfield

My Mayfield lot is narrow. Can the new driveway be wider than the old one?

Inside the boundary it can go as wide as the gap between the house and the fence allows, and on a lot cut up for workers after 1915 that gap is often the whole answer. At the kerb City of Newcastle's drawing A1300 gives a single residential crossing 2.5 to 3.0 metres wide, and going past that means a double crossing of up to 4.5 metres on a Section 138 (Type 1) application. On many Mayfield frontages it is the lot, not council, that sets the width.

Is a driveway down the side of a Mayfield house a truck job or a pump job?

Usually a pump or a line of barrows, because the older streets are narrow and the side access on a workers' lot rarely fits a truck chute. That does not change the concrete, only the day. The pump is priced into the job, the truck parks on the street, and a small load still costs a crew's time, which is why the side path and the back slab are best poured with the driveway rather than on a second visit.

Is Mayfield affected by mine subsidence?

Mostly not. On the state map the bulk of Mayfield's streets are shaded as outside any mine subsidence district, and the only district land is a small pocket at the south eastern corner beside Mayfield East and Tighes Hill. A property on that side is worth a look on the NSW Planning Portal Spatial Viewer before a garage slab is priced. For the driveway itself the question does not arise, since Subsidence Advisory NSW exempts driveways and hard stand spaces under all its guidelines except 4 and 5.

Mayfield, 2304

Measured on the block, not priced from a photo

One independent local concreter, one site visit, one figure in writing for a Mayfield driveway.