I had no curbing on my front yard for almost three years and mother nature took its toll on it with constant erosion from run off. The town finally put some asphalt curbing in and I was wondering what the best course of action is for making it less of an eyesore. Is it just as simple as throwing some lawn soil to fill in the gap and seeding it?
by sjs6494
3 Comments
Looks like it was never backfilled after paving. Could contact your local government to claim an incomplete job, especially if the whole road looks like this.
fill in with clean gravel, or then you have muddy water pooling onto the pavement if you fill with dirt. that’s my opinion,
Throwing loose soil and seed into that trench is a complete waste of your time. That new black asphalt is going to bake the edge in the summer and the street runoff will wash loose dirt away before any seed even sprouts. You need to take a flat spade and cut a clean vertical edge a few inches back into the healthy grass to remove that dead crusty overhang. Fill the gap with a solid mix of topsoil and compost making sure it sits completely flush with the top of the new asphalt berm. Tamp it down hard with your boots so it does not sink and create a puddle trap later.
Once your soil is packed flush you can put down your grass seed. You absolutely must pin down an erosion control blanket over it or use straw with a tackifier spray. If you leave bare dirt sitting against that curb the next rainstorm will carry your expensive seed straight into the storm drain. Keep it moist until the roots grab hold of the base.
Honestly keeping grass alive right against hot black asphalt is a constant battle. You might want to consider cutting a clean sweeping bed a foot back and filling it with river rock or a hardy groundcover instead of fighting the turf. Snap a picture of the curb and upload it to the GardenDream web app to see what a stone border looks like. It is a great blueprint tool to test out hardscape ideas and save yourself a massive headache before you spend your weekend hauling wheelbarrows of dirt.