Dave: Hi. I’m Dave Epstein. This is Growing Wisdom. And today, my driveway is going to be redone. It needs it and I found a great guy to do the work, John McNulty of McNulty Construction Corporation. And John, what’s the process that we’re going to undergo today?
John: Well, the first thing we’re going to do is we’re going to excavate the loom area that we’re going to wide the driveway. And then we’re going to excavate the driveway and remove that and get rid of it. We’ll see what we have for under laying if we have a lot of loamy area or what we have underneath. We’re going to install processed gravels so we’re going to have a good solid base to work with. And then from there, we’ll put down the first coating of asphalt which would be coarse with a little bit of larger stones. And then we’re going to put down a second coating of asphalt which is the top coat. That’s the finest coat so you get the very smooth look to it.
Dave: I hear people say, “You know, I should have this much asphalt.” What’s the big deal here?
John: The good thing is that we start off right. You got to make sure that you got good gravel underneath and that the ground is solid. And then once you get the solid base, you can build from there. We do an inch and a half base coarse and an inch and a half topcoat and it has always worked for us over the years. It’s a good industry standard too.
Dave: John, people who watch this might think, “What does a driveway have to do with gardens but it really does set the lawns from the gardens off. You know, it’s what you see when you pull into a property. And also, we try to be environmental. You know, I teach folks about conservation and we talk about being organic. Your business actually does do that a little bit, doesn’t it?
John: We do a little bit because when we take up the asphalt, we recycle it. We bring it to a place where they crush it back into gravels and then we put it back in the driveways.
Dave: John, we’re midway through the process. What are some misconceptions that people have about this industry or about what you do?
John: Basically, you are shown to a job where you don’t know what’s underneath, you could have gravel, you have to have a lot of gravel in this area. But if you have some great issues, we had to change it a little bit. You don’t know until you see what’s here. Every driveway has its own specific unique design and its own unique problems. So we have to correct those for each individual job. So we have to customize every driveway for every customer.
Dave: John, tell me a little bit about McNulty and a little bit about you.
John: We’re a small paving company. My father has had this business twenty something years ago. We loved what we do and we feel that we’re the best of what we do otherwise we shouldn’t be here. We had a bunch of really good guys, the do a good job. They put their heart and soul into it so that every job comes out good.
Dave: So John, I’m amazed at how quickly we got this done. It’s like five hours. And now, I’ve got a nice place for people to come in and no more dips and it’s going to be a lot easier in the winter. I really appreciated it. Thank you very much. It’s a pleasure working with you. And we hope you come back every week for all of our tips and some helps here at Growing Wisdom.
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