Driveway Pavement Options?

  I'm a homeowner with a 1920s house in Columbia, SC and want to install
a new driveway.  It will be about 2700 SF in all so I need to keep
costs in line.

I have bids for as low as $9,500, and that includes some engraving or
scoring in a nice diamond pattern.  I'm concerned about color and
texture.  I want something other than gray brushed concrete, and I
don't like the stained or stamped look.  I saw online some interesting
looking aggregates with very fine aggregate, more natural looking
colors.  The site is: http://www.exposedaggregateconcrete.com/menu.htm

But every dealer and contractor I speak to here wants to do what they
do well, not what I want.
It seems they work with local materials and warn me that importing
stone or dyes is going to be very expensive.  They quote prices that
are double or more what the current bid is, and even then it doesn't
seem they are confident they could produce what I want.

I feel like I'm going against the grain and it is wearing me down.

What is your advice on building an attractive driveway at a reasonable
cost?

--Don

 
I'm sorry I can't help with driveway options, but as someone in the
midst of a home construction, I symathize with your plight.   just
cause you've seen a neat detail on TV or elsewhere, don't count on
getting it done locally.  If they try something new and different and
it goes south, it makes them look bad and you are disappointed. Can't
blame them, really.

  In a previous post Don wrote...

Either pay the money or use what the local experts can provide at the
price you want to pay.

--
Bob Morrison, PE, SE
R L Morrison Engineering Co
Structural & Civil Engineering
Poulsbo WA
bob at rlmorrisonengr dot com

 It's a DRIVEWAY.   pour the concrete, saw it and be done.  It's a driveway,
you're going to park and drive cars on it.  It's a driveway.

--
Steve Barker

 Along the same lines, is the rest of the lot and surroundings so hideous
that you want to draw everyone's eyes to the driveway pavement? (Tough
neighborhood.)

Sometimes you want things to recede visually so that something else can be
prominent.
--


MichaelB
www.michaelbulatovich.ca