Driveways and Culverts in Duncan

Which authority owns the road

Three different answers apply within this valley. The Ministry of Transportation and Transit requires a highway use permit to create or change access off a provincially owned controlled access or numbered highway, but states that property owners do not need one for a single family dwelling where the property is off a provincially maintained side road outside the municipal boundary and the access is not off a controlled access highway or numbered route. North Cowichan requires a highway access permit under its Highway Use Bylaw before any driveway or boulevard crossing is built, at $25 to process, a refundable deposit of $500 per unit to a maximum of $2,000, and a $50 street sweeping fee, with access prohibited within seven metres of an intersection or an approved stop sign. The City of Duncan issues its own driveway access permit at $50 with a $1,000 damage deposit, and requires site inspections before construction starts.

Base, material and the culvert

A driveway that lasts is mostly what is underneath it. The base does the work, the surface material is chosen for the grade and the traffic, and a crossing over a ditch or watercourse needs a culvert sized for what actually runs through it in January rather than what is visible in August. Rubble — asphalt, brick, concrete, gravel and rock — is accepted at CVRD recycling centres at $94 per tonne, so removing an old surface has a disposal cost attached to it that is worth knowing before the work starts.

What a driveway scope usually covers

• New driveway construction

  Cut, subgrade shaping, base and running surface on a new access.

• Turnarounds and widening

  Room to turn a vehicle without reversing onto the road, and passing width where the run is long.

• Culvert installation

  Ditch and watercourse crossings with the pipe sized and covered correctly.

• Regrading and resurfacing

  Reshaping an existing driveway that has lost its crown or its drainage.

How a driveway job runs

1. 1

   Confirm the road authority — Provincial, municipal or regional — established before design, because it sets the permit, the timeline and sometimes the geometry.

2. 2

   Permit and locates — Access permit applied for, and BC 1 Call locates in hand. A locate ticket requires work to start within 14 calendar days.

3. 3

   Strip, shape and base — Existing surface off, subgrade shaped to shed water, and base material placed and compacted in lifts.

4. 4

   Culvert and surface — Any crossing installed with the right cover over the pipe, then the running surface placed and graded.

Local conditions

Driveway work in the Cowichan Valley runs across two very different subgrades. On the valley floor the material is river sand and gravel, which compacts well and drains. South toward Mill Bay and the Malahat, near-surface bedrock less than a metre down has been mapped across most of the area, so a cut for a driveway can turn into rock work — though the mapping also shows a buried bedrock valley where cover reaches up to 60 metres, which is why the answer comes from the site rather than from the map.

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