RDMcG

There can be runoff in a big thaw but the driveway has a full drain at the bottom. No problem there

petee_c

that's a lot of money to pay to get rid of snow..... what happens when the plow goes by?

993GT

surprised its not more common, particularly for smaller city properties, salt is nasty stuff as an alternative
cost seems extremely out of line, was there heavy restructuring not in pics? or is this just GTA things...

RDMcG

They used a digger to do this. It is quite deep. No concerns re plow. They do not plow the laneway and it is no sweat with an SUV with snows. Will be interesting to see when we get heavy stuff.

steam_mill

Wow.....I thought most of these were electric and were left on for most of the winter so that the driveway would never freeze. We used to have a plow service come by to clear the driveway and shovel the walks. After it changing ownership 3X in 3 years and use having to call for them to come and plow, I just gave up and bought a snowblower. I figure, I go out walking when it is snowing why not just clean it myself.

RDMcG

I went that route too when my service went bankrupt. Many of them are being killed by insurance premiums. My problem was that there was nowhere to pile the snow so I ended up not using the driveway at all and just clearing the walkway into the driveway.
I will report back later in the season as to how much it costs to run and how well it works.

.2PDK

That's what wives are for...

ekam

With global warming, you won't need this in a few years...? j/k

vntperformance

$100k for that small of an area, sounds like someone shafted you.

Crazy Canuck

We put in a heated ramp. Takes 2 boilers to heat.
Insulation required under pad.
Then equal length piping to control valves. If piping is not equal length it won't melt uniformly.
Then rebar.
Then concrete.
Then stone or block if desired. We did thicker concrete as there will be semis on it.

There are 2 ways to run it. Idle means its on all the time or a sensor. Once sensor is covered by snow it tells the boilers to fire up and pumps to start pumping glycol.
It's not fast but it's steady. In our case it made sense as we didn't want to dump salt on the ramp all the time and potentially have a semi slide into the building. It gets morning sun then would ice up in the afternoon while in the shade.
The best thing is the tenant pays for the gas to heat it.
The HVAC was around $60k. Plus the rebar, insulation, concrete etc but we were doing most of that anyway.

I've thought about doing it at home and it would be great on my front walkway but I get a tenant to do my snow blowing and shoveling for $700/yr. Gas would be a minimum of a few hundred bucks a month to operate the system. It's cool when it's snowing and steam is rising off the driveway but not cost effective for me, especially since my house faces south and melts pretty easily.

hoffa

I looked into it when doing a giant driveway with pavers. It was an incremental 15-2k0 and at the end of a very expensive home construction I thought that was a luxury I didnt need. I regret it. The opex isnt that bad. You keep it 2-3c, the thermal mass will do the rest.

rideau

I live in the same area as Ronan. Costs for projects that require machinery (basement excavation, driveway excavation) are more because of limited access and difficult removal of material. Machinery is necessarily much smaller and some projects are done in the old fashioned way..man, shovel, wheelbarrow. I was telling my brother-in-law from Calgary how Cabbagetown basements are dug out to increase floor height. Men with shovels in basement, tossing soil onto a very old conveyor belt contraption that goes from basement, usually through a window and, if one is lucky, into a bin. If not, man, shovel, wheelbarrow is required to place in bin...more $$$$$. He did not believe me until I took him to see an ongoing project.
Now for the next trick...delivery of aggregate, concrete and paving stones.....another logistical challenge that is usually met by more $$$$$.
One recent project to renovate a back yard patio required men, shovels, wheelbarrows removing material to actually go through the main floor of the house to get into the street...the reverse to bring in new materials.
Not my project thank goodness!

Mikster

Sweet. You're neighborhood look familiar..I live in midtown and had my driveway completely redone this fall as well. I'd say mine is about 2-3 times larger than yours, and yes I can attest to the cost. Just the *option* of adding heating to our existing driveway re-do was about $100k incremental. Lot's of work, and they need to put down a base, then the glycol tubes, then *another* base of concrete. And my driveway is sloped, making the need for this even greater!
In the end it was no-go for us since our contractor and real estate guy said we'd never recoup that cost in home value. We just break out the HeatTrak electric mats for the walkway portions, and the shovel and snowblower when needed for the driveway.

M

moab

I had this priced out for a double car width driveway that is about 40-50 feet long and price was 1/3

RDMcG

Was not just the driveway, there was a lot of reprofiling of the sidewalk and excavation, repairing cracked walls etc. As mentioned by Rideau above it is a very diffiicult place to get stuff in and out- cannot block the laneway which is a right of way. so stuff has to be brought in in small batches, special very narrow diggers etc.