Rio Hondo El Monte Concrete replaces the strip drives, walks and garage slabs of Alhambra, 6 miles west of our yard along Valley Boulevard. Give us the address and the visit is booked.
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Alhambra was laid out in the 1900s and built up through the 1920s, so a lot here is long, narrow and older than anything we work on at home in El Monte. Most of the concrete on it is the original.
A drive that runs the depth of a lot to a rear garage has 3 or 4 times the joints of a modern one, and it was poured in the 1920s as 2 ribbons or as short panels with no base under them. Each panel has moved on its own for a century, and what fails is not the slab but the line between two, which opens into a lip that catches a tire. The ground is finer than the river gravel under El Monte, silt and sand that holds water into spring, so the lowest panel stays wet longest and drops first.
That is why we replace the whole run and not the worst panel. The old ribbons come out to firm ground, the strip is cut wider where the lot allows it, and 4 inches of Class 2 base goes down and is compacted before any steel is set. Number 3 bar runs the length on an 18 inch grid, joints are cut every 10 feet within 12 hours of the pour, and the new slab is doweled into the garage apron so the two move together at the one place they meet.
Alhambra was subdivided when the garage stood at the back of the lot and a car was 5 feet wide. What we replace here is the concrete that layout left behind, a drive twice the length it needs to be and a walk squeezed between two houses.
An Alhambra driveway runs the length of the lot to a garage at the back, and most were poured as 2 ribbons with grass between. We replace them as one slab, 4 inches on compacted base, with a joint every 10 feet so the length cracks where we cut it and nowhere else.
Alhambra back yards end at the garage, so a patio here is fitted between the house, the garage and one fence rather than laid out in the open. We pour it to the threshold, slope it a quarter inch a foot away from both buildings, and barrow it in when a truck cannot reach.
Stamped work in Alhambra tends to be a front walk or a porch apron on a Spanish or Craftsman house, so the pattern is chosen to sit with the house rather than against it. A slate or wood plank texture in an integral tan, sealed in 2 coats, on the same 4 inch slab as plain work.
The walk between two Alhambra houses is often under 3 feet wide and carries the gas line and the sewer lateral beneath it. We locate both before the saw goes in, pour the new walk on 2 inches of base, and hold the top flush with the neighbor's slab where the two meet.
A detached Alhambra garage from the 1920s sits on a slab 3 inches thick with no steel and often no base, and it has cracked and dropped at the door. We break the old floor out inside the framing, pour 4 inches with a thickened edge at the door, and leave it flat enough to coat.
Exposed aggregate suits the older streets of Alhambra because it hides the dust and leaf stain a plain gray slab shows under the street trees. We wash the top matrix off the afternoon the slab is poured, so the stone shows evenly from the curb to the garage, and seal it once dry.
The Alhambra streets on the San Marino line rise a little, and a poured wall there holds the front lawn above the sidewalk. We foot it 12 inches into firm ground, drain it behind the stem, and keep it under 4 feet where the grade allows, since a taller wall is engineered first.
Six Alhambra homes in 10 are rented, and a converted garage or a rear unit needs a slab someone will live on. We pour over a vapor barrier, dowel the new slab to the old footing, and float it flat enough for tile or plank, because the inspector checks the floor before framing.
Valley Boulevard runs from our yard straight into Alhambra, 6 miles west, so a crew is at the address in about 20 minutes and the truck follows the same road. Permits go to the Building Division of the City of Alhambra at City Hall on First Street, and an apron or a walk in the public right of way takes an encroachment permit from Public Works as well. We file both and meet the inspector, and because the city dates from 1903 its tract maps show where a line sits under a shared drive.
The blocks between Main Street and Valley Boulevard were built out first, and the houses on them are bungalows on lots narrow enough that the drive runs beside the house rather than in front of it, which is where the long drives come from. North of Main Street toward the San Marino line the lots widen and the houses grow, and south of Valley Boulevard many of the 1920s houses gave way to 1960s apartment buildings, whose parking courts are the biggest slabs we pour anywhere in the city.
The 710 ends at Valley Boulevard in Alhambra and has for decades, and the traffic it drops onto Fremont Avenue and Atlantic Boulevard is the reason a job on either street is scheduled for a Saturday morning, when a mixer can stand at the curb for an hour. Alhambra Wash takes the city's runoff south to the Rio Hondo, which passes our own yard, so a slab graded to the gutter here drains, in the end, past the place it was estimated from.
Four steps for a lot where the drive is the access, since a mixer cannot reach a rear garage and the concrete goes in by barrow or by pump. The measure settles that before the day is booked, so the figure never changes on site.
Ismael Duarte walks the drive from curb to garage, probes under the worst panel, checks where the gas and sewer cross and photographs the gate.
Building permit to the City of Alhambra, encroachment permit to Public Works for the apron. Both are ours to file and chase, not yours.
The old ribbons come out to firm ground, soft silt is dug and replaced, and 4 inches of Class 2 base is compacted in 2 lifts before the steel.
One pour, joints cut within 12 hours, and you walk on it after 24 hours. The garage is yours again on the seventh day, and the strip is swept.
Ring or send the form and you hear back within 1 business day with a visit date. Ismael Duarte measures the drive, the walk or the yard at the address, opens the ground where the old slab has dropped, and writes the figure before he leaves.
Reviews
Reviews left on Google and Facebook by homeowners across the towns this site covers. Alhambra is among them, and each review names the job it was written about.
“Our drive had sunk where the water line went in years ago and you could feel it in the car. They dug the soft fill right out, rolled clean base into it and put 540 square feet down at four inches. Ismael was here at seven in the morning and the saw went over it before he went home.”
“A ficus outside our place on Ramona had lifted two panels and we were getting complaints about it. They sawed out on the joints, cut the roots back behind a barrier, laid seventy feet of new walk and took care of the encroachment permit themselves. Nobody catches a foot on it now.”
“We use the garage as a workshop and the old floor was cracked right across, with the edges crumbling away wherever you swept. It came out, a heavy sheet went down over the sand, and five inches of new floor went on top. A year of trolley jacks and there is not a mark on it.”
The six things an Alhambra owner asks before booking, from what a long drive costs to who issues the permit, what the ground here does in a wet winter and how long a rear garage is out of use.
Length, then access. A drive to a rear garage in Alhambra is 2 or 3 times the area of a drive to an attached one, and if the strip is too narrow for a truck the concrete goes in by pump, which adds a day. Tearing out 2 ribbons and the grass between them comes next. Every estimate is measured and written on site, and the length is taped rather than guessed from the street.
The Building Division of the City of Alhambra, at City Hall on First Street, for anything structural, and Public Works for the apron and the parkway walk, which sit in the public right of way. Flatwork at grade in your own yard needs neither. We file what the job needs before a date is set, and the inspector sees the base and the steel before the pour.
6 miles along Valley Boulevard, which is about 20 minutes with a loaded truck. That matters because concrete has 90 minutes from the plant to the forms, and a short run means the load arrives workable. We are in Alhambra most weeks, so the measure is booked for the week you call and someone rings you back within 1 business day to fix the day.
Because they were poured as 2 ribbons with grass between, on silty ground and with no base, and the two strips have moved separately for 90 years. The ground under Alhambra holds water into spring where El Monte's gravel drains in a day, so the low strip stays wet and sinks. A single slab on compacted base, jointed every 10 feet, cracks only where the saw went.
About 10 days in Alhambra. The tear-out and the base take 2 days, the pour a third, and then the slab needs 24 hours before you walk on it and 7 days before a car drives its length to the garage. We tell you the pour date the day before, so the car is on the street before the forms go in and back in the garage the following week.
Yes. Monterey Park, San Gabriel, Rosemead and South Pasadena are all on this site and all reached from the same yard, and San Marino sits on the north line. A lot on Atlantic Boulevard or Garvey Avenue may turn out to be in Monterey Park rather than Alhambra, and that changes which city issues the permit, not how the slab is built.
Alhambra shares a boundary with San Gabriel, Monterey Park, South Pasadena and San Marino, and we pour in all four from the same El Monte yard. If your street runs along one of those lines, the town next door has its own page and its own permit counter.
Open the El Monte Office in Google Maps Ring or send the form. The estimate is written at the address and the work carries a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built.