JACK TODD PAVING INC

Jack Todd Paving did an extremely thorough and complete job re-contouring our entire driveway to take care of multiple problems, including the car scraping when coming in, flooding for both us and our neighbor, a difficult turn-around and most importantly - our challenging drainage. Jack’s innovative design for the drainage gained the critical 2” of fall needed for the driveway to drain completely. He completely dug out the old uneven foundation, compressed the sub-soil, put in several inches of new gravel and sand, compressed and contorted them, and then put down 2 inches of large stone road asphalt and an additional inch of finish asphalt. Jack supervised the entire project from start to finish, operating much of the equipment himself. He and his entire crew were a pleasure to work with. Although some companies were far less expensive, their plans did not meet industry guidelines for this type of work and their drainage plans were woefully inadequate. But when you take into account that the cheapest guys were only planning on using about 1/3 of the material that Jack used and estimated that they could get the job done in a day while Jack’s crew took more than 3 days of solid work, I feel strongly that Jack Todd’s price was fair and that the quality of his work speaks for itself. I watched his work from start to finish and was impressed by the effort and conscientious attention to detail he and his men had. He and his crew even cleaned up the street so it is far cleaner than when they started. He and his crew have earned my highest regard and I can recommend him without hesitation. Background and important details: We were so afraid of adding to any of our neighbors’ flooding problems that we lived with a pond for a driveway and a swamp for a backyard for over 15 years. We spent a lot of time making calls, making notes and asking for estimates from every contractor who would come out, regardless of how far away they were. We called companies that paved, excavated and most especially, those that specialized in drainage. Our neighbor’s garage is lower than our garage although it is situated higher on the driveway. So it is impossible to fill the driveway without flooding his garage. There was nowhere to drain, since our backyard was higher than the end of the driveway and the city storm drain was higher than the bottom of our driveway. The result was that our driveway became a large pond after serious rains. Compounding the problem was the lack of drop between the neighbor’s garage and the bottom of the driveway, making filling the pond impossible. Our driveway was declared to be unsolvable by the most often reviewed firm on Angie’s List (Dave Decker, owner of Bloomington Sealcoat). He said he would not do the drainage and if he did the paving, there would be puddles or a big puddle. He wanted to put in the driveway before the drainage was done. Every other contractor said that would be just one rain away from flooding our neighbor’s garage. After I told Dave that Jack Todd said it could be done, his response was that “Jack enjoys these types of impossible jobs and if he wants to waste his time on this nightmare he should do it.” Dave’s negative assessments of the scope of our problem was just one of several we received. After an exhaustive search, we were able to confirm what Dave had indicated: Jack Todd was perhaps the only company that had a reputation for expertise in both paving a minimal fall driveway as well as the expertise to drain it properly. From the outcome we now have, that reputation is well justified. We can recommend his work without reservation.

Good interactions. I would have liked more contact on missing the original target date. However, very nicely done.