Nowadays, the majority of commercial parking lots are made up of asphalt. However, there is a wide range of new and even traditional alternatives that you can use for your parking lot. It wouldn’t hurt if you try an alternative paving material for asphalt, right? It doesn’t matter if you want to reduce your environmental impact, you want to utilize something that appears different, or perhaps you want to try something more cost-effective for you. Nevertheless, asphalt has many competitors in terms of building parking lots. Here are some of them that you can consider: 

Permeable/porous pavements  

These pavement types work like gravel and grass. They give eco-friendly water management as well. Because of that, rain, storms, and more won’t be an issue since the water can pave its way via the pavement, pavement base, and ground beneath.   

Usually, this pavement type’s base is spaced out of a stone bed. The stone bed allows any liquid to allow it to return to the earth. The key here is to make the stone bed the right depth to keep the water from rising to the asphalt level.   

Gravel  

One of the simplest and budget-friendly solutions to your paving concerns is to use gravel since it’s quite low maintenance, easy to lay, and affordable. However, what about the lost rocks? Should they have to be eventually replaced? Again, there are very cheap and simple solutions to cleaning and keeping up your gravel parking lot. For instance, you can consider applying lattice systems that give a honeycomb-like structure where the asphalt can rack in. This can help to prevent it from being loosely kicked out around by your automobiles.   

The benefits of using gravel are that it’s porous. Meaning, you don’t have to worry about water pooling, penetrating cracks, which causes your pavement to form into potholes and crack. Once you use asphalt, the water only gets absorbed right through it into the earth. Since you don’t have to worry about potholes, it will be great for business owners, pedestrians, and vehicles who want to prevent lawsuits.    

Permeable solutions  

Permeable solutions enable the drainage right through the parking lot itself. A lot of traditional asphalt parking lots need storm gutters. However, the best thing about installing permeable pavements includes: 

  • Not needing the gutters to be cleared of debris. 
  • Not needing frequent maintenance. 
  • Not needing water drainage gutters. 

Plus, this type of surface doesn’t need to be seal coated compared to a traditional asphalt parking lot.  

Grass  

The grass is a good option to use for parking lots that do not cater to many automobiles. However, what about those parking lots that do? The grass is a highly recommended alternative for busy parking lots with the help of pavers similar to the lattice paver. The lattice can keep the grass in the place. Hence, it will not easily rut, wear off, or end up getting damaged. Similar to concrete, you don’t have to be concerned about expensive maintenance with grass lots. Liquid seepage, potholes, and more will be a thing of the past.  

But if you want to have an asphalt paver for your parking lot, contact www.mesapavingandsealcoating.com today.