Looking after your paving.

If you only take one thing from this page, take this. Segmental paving is not a collection of pavers sitting on sand. It is an interlocked structure, where every single paver is braced on all sides by its neighbours through a firm, full joint. That interlock is what lets a 60mm paver carry a two-tonne car. Empty the joints and each paver becomes an individual little block, free to rock, free to work the bedding sand out from under itself, and the base underneath starts to fail. Every expensive paving problem in Geraldton starts with an empty joint.

Our sea breeze, the Geraldton Doctor, blows hard most summer afternoons and makes this a bigger deal here than anywhere inland. Loose washed jointing sand simply leaves. It is scoured out through summer and washed out through the 440mm of rain that arrives between May and August. Stabilised or polymeric jointing sand binds into a firm but flexible joint that resists both, which is why we use it as standard. The maintenance difference is stark: stabilised joints go 10 to 15 years before a full re-sand, loose washed sand on a coastal block needs one every two to three years, forever.

The twice-a-year, ten-minute check.

Walk your paving in autumn and again in spring, and look for five things. It takes ten minutes and it is the whole maintenance program:

• Look down between the pavers. If you can see a gap below the paver surface, the joints are emptying. This is your cue to re-sand, and it is the cheapest moment in the whole lifecycle.
• Step on a few, especially in the wheel tracks. Any paver that clicks or rocks has a void under it. Do not wait on this one.
• Check the edges. If the outermost row is leaning out, off line, or the joints are wider near the edge, your edge restraint is going. Re-establishing it is $25 to $45 per linear metre and it saves the whole field.
• Look after rain. A puddle that sits where one never used to sit means the levels have shifted, which means the base has moved.
• Feel for lips with your foot. Anything over about 3mm is worth fixing while it is still one paver. AS 1428.1 treats 3mm as the threshold where a bevel becomes necessary.

Any of those turning up means read the warning signs guide, which explains what stage you are at and what it costs at each one.

Sealing limestone, and the coastal clock.

Limestone is a genuinely porous natural stone, and that porosity is exactly why it is so pleasant to walk on: it stays cool underfoot in a 38 degree Geraldton February and it grips when it is wet. The trade is that it needs sealing. A penetrating sealer soaks into the stone and blocks the pores without changing the pale, natural look the way a topical gloss coat would.

Cadence depends entirely on how much salt is in your air, and in Geraldton that is essentially a function of your distance from the surf. Inland, three to five years between coats is fine. Within about a kilometre of the water at Tarcoola Beach, Drummond Cove and Glenfield, make it two to three. What you are preventing is salt attack: salt carried in on the breeze soaks into the pores, crystallises as the moisture evaporates in the sun, and the crystals slowly wedge the stone apart from the inside. That is why unsealed coastal limestone frets at its arrises and goes powdery. Your tell that a re-coat is due is simple. Tip a glass of water on it. If it beads, you are fine. If it soaks in and darkens the stone, book it.

Pressure washing, and the mistake nearly everyone makes.

You can pressure wash paving. You must re-sand it afterwards. A pressure washer removes jointing sand faster than the Doctor manages in an entire summer, which is why so many Geraldton driveways start rocking about a year after somebody cleaned them and stood back proud. The cleaning was not the problem. Not re-sanding was.

If you are doing it yourself, use a 15 to 25 degree fan tip rather than a pencil jet, keep the lance at least 300mm off the surface, work in even passes rather than hovering, and go gentle on limestone, which is soft enough to etch visible tracks into if you sit on one spot. Then top the joints back up with a stabilised sand, water it in, and let it cure dry. On clay brick pavers you have more latitude, because clay is dense and hard, but the joints are just as vulnerable.

Stains, blooms and the things that are not defects.

Efflorescence is the white powdery bloom that shows up on new concrete pavers, usually in the first 12 to 18 months. It is calcium carbonate, brought to the surface as free lime in the concrete reacts and moisture evaporates. It is not a defect, it is not a sign of a bad job, and it weathers off by itself with rain and traffic. Please do not attack it with strong acid, because acid washing can burn through the pigmented face layer of a concrete paver and leave a permanent patch where you had a temporary bloom.

Oil and fuel on a driveway wants a poultice, not a scrub. Absorbent powder or a proprietary paste drawn out over a day or two pulls the oil back up out of the paver rather than pushing it deeper, which is what a wire brush and detergent do. Moss and algae turn up on the shaded southern side of the house through our wet winter, and a gentle wash plus improving the light or drainage sorts it. And around pool surrounds, salt-chlorine splash-out is constant, so a fresh-water rinse now and then genuinely extends the surface, and sealing matters even more than it does elsewhere.

A worked example: the 45 square metre driveway over 30 years.

Take a standard Geraldton double driveway in concrete pavers, 45 square metres, built properly with stabilised joints. Over 30 years the realistic maintenance bill looks like this. Two full re-sands at $15 to $35 per square metre, so $675 to $1,575 each, call it $1,400 to $3,100 total. Maybe one edge restraint repair somewhere, $25 to $45 per linear metre over a few metres, so a couple of hundred dollars. And a wash when it looks tired, followed by a re-sand.

Total: roughly $1,600 to $3,400 over three decades on a driveway that cost $4,200 to $6,000 to build. Now run the same driveway with loose washed jointing sand and no maintenance. Empty joints by year two, rocking by year four, dishing by year six, and a full lift and relay at $45 to $80 per square metre, so $2,000 to $3,600, at least twice in thirty years. Worse driveway, more money, more disruption. The rates are all on the pricing page, and the lifespan guide covers what you are buying with them.