South Carolina
Commercial lots, driveways, chip-and-tar and sealcoating from the Lowcountry through Columbia and Rock Hill to the Upstate — built for sand, salt and a water table that never gets far from the surface.
Request a South Carolina EstimateThe Lowcountry is sandy subgrade sitting on a water table close to the surface. It drains far better than Piedmont clay and fails in the opposite way: not heaving, but undermining. Water moving under a lot carries the base out from beneath a surface that still looks sound, and the lot goes at the edges and the low corners first. Grading that moves water off the site does more here than any extra inch of mat.
Humid, hot, and salt-laden near the coast. Effectively no freeze-thaw, so the enemy is oxidation and salt rather than ice — which makes sealcoating on a real maintenance cycle worth more in Charleston or Myrtle Beach than almost anything done at construction time.
SCDOT Standard Specifications for Highway Construction — over a base built to drain, with a 96% Marshall Unit Weight minimum compaction floor.