Sidewalk Savers™

Spring Fever means it’s time for the Annual Sidewalk Safety Inspection and repair.

Just in time for all the Springtime outdoor activities, it is important for every homeowner, shopkeeper, or Apartment manager, and every City or Park Maintenance Department to perform annual Sidewalk Safety Inspections and to grind down those annoying and dangerous Stub-Toe Hazards.

Here in Ohio, it is wonderful to enjoy the first warm days of Spring as walkers, strollers, children on tricycles or walking to school, skate-boarders, bicycles, and wheel chairs get out and start moving past our homes. Today it reached 78 Degrees!

Naturally, we want neighbors and passers-by to be safe as they walk, jog, or ride past our homes and businesses. There is also the additional peace of mind that comes from preventing exposure to negligence liability claims, either personally or for our Insurance companies. An annual expenditure of less than one or two hundred dollars and/or a few hours of time can make everybody’s life a lot Smoother.

What are you doing in your Neighborhood? In your city? Please post your comments and let us know if you need help getting your city to take an active interest.

Grind It. Cut It. Fix It. ™

Sidewalker

It is now nearly 20 years since I encountered my first Concrete Grinding and Cutting Project in what would eventually become Sidewalk Savers Ltd.    Living in the central Ohio area, my car was frequently dragging Ice Melt Rock Salt from the local highways and streets onto my garage floor.   Sigh …..    Perhaps many of you have seen this in your own garages as the 1 or 2   feet of concrete garage floor nearest to the driveway, becomes pitted and spalled by the highway residue dripping from the car to the floor each evening.   

During the summer of 1987, I was looking at this problem in my own 14 year old garage when I saw my next door neighbor solve the same problem in his home by having the 4 foot long section of his Garage Floor professionally removed by Diamond Sawing and then replaced with a new section of concrete floor.     Being somewhat strapped for cash myself, I looked at the array of Diamond Saw Blades and Diamond Grinding Cups on my work bench as I contemplated doing this job for myself.   

My methods involved a combination of sawing, chipping, and grinding to a depth of 1” for the width of my driveway and for a length of  18” so that I could use good old packaged Concrete mix to produce a new layer of Concrete Garage Floor 16 feet x  1.5 feet  x 1” deep.    The bad news was that it was a lot more work than I had bargained for.     The good news was that I had produced a very rough surface to which the newly mixed concrete bonded very well.   Twenty Years Later, the results are in:  I did an amazingly good job, if I do say so myself.   ([:^  )      The floor still looks great.

Now, for the True Confession part of my story:  I protected myself with a Respirator and goggles while Sawing, but I was way too casual about protecting the rest of my garage,  my poor boat, and even my house from the dust.   Dust went everywhere!       It was not until 15 years later when contemplating the Sidewalk Savers Solution that I found the people at Dust-Muzzle and  Loveless Ash.       

Bottom line:  The methods and the Tools are now readily available to tackle these very common problems without exposing yourself to the concrete dust, so don’t ignore it.

……….      Grind It.  Cut It.  Fix It. ™

Sidewalker

One aspect of the Simple Sidewalk Grinding Procedures is frequently overlooked. The DIY Homeowner or even the customer who pays someone else to grind his Sidewalk Trip Hazards will be amazed at how easily Diamond Tools can reshape and finish the concrete. This is clearly a case where seeing is believing.

Additional applications around the house or shop suddenly become feasible, even though not necessarily by the DIY homeowner. Repairing a basement floor low spot was my first “extra curricular” project as I found that my crack sealer blade and 4.5” diamond cup could make a small trough from a low spot in the basement floor to the drain that was 10” away. 15 minutes of grinding and the 25 year old basement (washing machine) puddle problem was forever gone!

This was clearly a case of me being a kid with a new tool. I was on the march looking for other problems to solve. Our garden sidewalk and our patio presented the next correctable defects in my path. Nice!

The beautiful aggregate that was exposed by my grinding the front sidewalk and patio made me contemplate grinding the entire patio as I moved from maintenance grinding to Decorative Concrete Grinding. But, that’s another story.

Other homeowners could very easily consider a wall-sawing option for enhancing the usefulness and beauty of their basement by cutting new larger windows or doors. This is really a great way to add value to the right house. This is clearly a job for the Professionals, and who would have thought of it if they hadn’t first started by grinding that little Stub-Toe Trip Hazard on their front sidewalk?

Bottom line: While grinding down that Stub Toe Hazard, don’t forget to think about other projects around the home. And, by all means, post your questions and your stories here so that we can help steer you in the right direction.

Grind It. Cut It. Fix It. ™

Sidewalker

Most Sidewalk Trip Hazards tend to Grow over time. They start out as 1/4″ bumps and over a period of 2 or 3 years they move from being a minor annoyance to being a full fledged Trip Hazard. Since nobody calls in a Concrete Contractor to repair the sidewalk for minor problems, there has really been not much a homeowner or shopkeeper could do beyond watching it grow.

Generally, the Shopkeeper reaches his pain thresh-hold where he can no longer ignore the problem when the bump hits 3/4″ or when he receives a “Love Letter” from the City advising him that he needs to replace the defective pavement block. A homeowner’s thresh-hold for ignoring the problem has historically been Lots higher, with the real procrastinators risking “Love Letters” from their local attorney by ignoring Stub Toe Hazards in the 3″ - 4″ range. The real advantage for Diamond Grinding is the low cost of equipment and the relative ease for eliminating even the smallest of trip hazards.

Bottom line: There is no longer any excuse for allowing Stub-Toe, Trip Hazards to exist. What are your thoughts on the subject?

Grind It. Cut It. Fix It. ™

Sidewalker

Here are some photographs of a Rest Area that I happened to visit in South Dakota in July 2006. It is interesting to think of the time spent painting the Stub-Toe Trip Hazards as compared to the time required to grind them and actually eliminate the hazards. These are the types of Trip Hazards that are spaced far enough apart and seemingly minor until someone actually trips and falls.

Our Sidewalk Savers approach could eliminate the minor problems before they become big problems. And just think of the benefits from eliminating Alert Orange Paint on the Sidewalks!

Grind It. Cut It. Fix It. ™

 Sidewalker