Rio Hondo El Monte Concrete pours driveways, patios and garage slabs in La Puente, a short run east on Valley Boulevard. Every estimate is measured and written on site, and the visit is free.
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La Puente sits on two kinds of ground. The north is flat valley floor laid down by San Jose Creek, the south climbs onto the toe of the Puente Hills, and a slab built for one fails on the other.
The creek ground is sandy silt that drains and compacts well, so a driveway north of Main Street needs a firm base and little else. The hill ground is different material altogether. The Puente Hills are marine siltstone and shale, and the soil that weathers off them is a clay that swells when it gets wet and shrinks through the dry months, so a slab poured straight onto it lifts at one corner every winter and drops back every summer until it cracks along the line between the two.
So the specification here is set by the street, not by the job. On the creek ground we strip to firm material, compact 4 inches of base and pour 4 inches of concrete with joints every 10 feet. On the hill ground the slab is thickened to 5 inches, carries number 3 steel on an 18 inch grid, and sits on 6 inches of base over a subgrade we have wetted and compacted, so the clay under it has already done its swelling before the concrete goes down.
La Puente packs 40,000 people into about 3.5 square miles, and most of the houses went up in the ten years either side of incorporation in 1956. The concrete we are asked for here is the concrete that makes a small lot hold more.
The single width driveway is the La Puente job we do most, widened to a double because the household has three cars and the street has room for one. We saw the old edge, extend the base out to the new line, and pour the new panel doweled into the old so the two never step apart.
A patio behind a 1950s La Puente house is usually the first slab the yard has had. The side yard is too narrow for a truck, so the concrete comes through the gate by barrow and the pour is planned around that, base and steel placed the day before and the slab poured early.
Stamped work in La Puente is mostly the front walk and the driveway border, where a house on a small lot has little else to show the street. We cast an ashlar or flagstone pattern into a 4 inch slab, color it integrally so a chip does not show gray, and seal it in 2 coats.
A La Puente walk from the gate to the door is short, but the public walk at the curb is often the one that has heaved, and that one belongs to the city. We rebuild the private walk, and for the public one we pull the encroachment permit and match the city's own 4 inch section.
Garage floors here were poured in the 1950s with no barrier under them and no steel in them, and after 70 years they sit cracked into plates. We take out the old slab, set a barrier over compacted base and pour a new 4 inch floor jointed on a grid so it stays flat enough to coat.
Exposed aggregate suits a La Puente front yard because the small stone reads well at close range and hides the dust of a valley summer. We pour a 4 inch slab, wash the surface at the right hour to bring the stone proud, and band the edge in smooth concrete so the edge is a line.
South of Amar Road the lots step up toward the Puente Hills, and a back yard that looks flat often carries 2 feet of fall to the fence. A wall on that clay is footed below the layer that swells, drained with gravel and a pipe behind the stem, and its steel is tied to the footing.
Garage conversions and back-house additions are common in La Puente because the lots are full and the households are large. The interior slab is poured over a vapor barrier on compacted base, finished flat enough for tile, and jointed on a grid that follows the room's walls.
The town takes its name from the bridge the Portola expedition built over San Jose Creek in 1769, and the creek still runs through the north of the city in a concrete channel. That matters to us because the ground either side of it is the creek's own sand and silt, the easiest ground in the valley to pour on, and because the channel marks where the flat ends. Our yard is about 6 miles west, and Valley Boulevard runs from our door through the City of Industry to La Puente.
La Puente is a small city ringed by county land. Bassett to the west, Valinda to the east and Avocado Heights and West Puente Valley to the south are all unincorporated, and all carry La Puente addresses. Inside the city line a permit comes from the building counter at La Puente City Hall on Main Street. Outside it the same driveway is permitted by the Los Angeles County Building and Safety Division, and we check the parcel before we quote so the right application goes in first time.
The lots decide the method. A tract lot here runs 5,000 to 6,000 square feet, the side yards are narrow and the house sits close to the street, so a truck rarely reaches a back yard and most patios are barrowed in through a gate. Front driveways are the exception. They meet the street, so the mixer chutes straight onto the forms and a single width becomes a double in a day. That is the job La Puente asks us for most, because the households are large and the parking is not.
Four steps and one written figure, and the first of them tells us which side of the creek line your lot sits on. Nothing is booked until the ground has been looked at, because the ground here is what sets the figure.
Ismael Duarte tapes the area, probes the subgrade for clay or fill, checks the gate width and writes the figure before he leaves.
We file with La Puente City Hall inside the city and with Los Angeles County for Bassett, Valinda and the other county pockets.
Old slab out, subgrade cut to firm ground, base compacted in lifts, steel tied on chairs. On hill clay the subgrade is wetted first.
Poured in one morning, joints cut the same day, walked on after 24 hours and driven on after 7 days. The gate is swept behind us.
Call or send the form and we call back within 1 business day with a time. The visit, the measure and the written figure are free, and the crew is in La Puente most weeks, so a date is rarely far off.
Reviews
These are the site's own reviews, left on Google and Facebook by homeowners across the towns we cover. La Puente is one of them, and the driveways behind the words are the ones described above.
“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.”
What La Puente homeowners want settled before they book, from which office issues the permit to why a slab on the south side of town is built thicker than one on the north.
Which ground it sits on, then how wide the gate is. A driveway on the flat creek ground north of Main Street takes a standard base and a 4 inch slab. One on the hill clay south of Amar Road takes a thicker base, steel and a 5 inch slab, and that is more material and more labor on the same square footage. Access moves it after that, because concrete barrowed through a side gate takes crew hours a chute does not.
La Puente City Hall on Main Street if the parcel is inside the city, and Los Angeles County Building and Safety if it is not. Bassett, Valinda, Avocado Heights and West Puente Valley all have La Puente addresses and are all county land. Flatwork at grade in your own yard usually needs no permit either way. A wall over 4 feet, a footing under a cover or a new apron across the public walk does, and we file it.
The yard is about 6 miles west along Valley Boulevard, which is 15 to 20 minutes with a loaded truck outside the school run. That is close enough that a job here is run the same as one on our own street. The estimate visit is booked within 1 business day of your call, and the crew that measured the work is the crew that pours it.
Because the ground under it is doing the moving. On the south side of La Puente the soil is clay off the Puente Hills, and clay swells when wet and shrinks when dry, so a slab poured straight onto it rises and falls with the seasons until it breaks. The fix is under the concrete, not in it. Cut out the soft clay, wet and compact what is left, lay 6 inches of base and pour a thicker slab with steel through it.
Two days on site for a single width driveway, three for a double, and then a wait. Concrete takes 24 hours before it will hold a person and 7 days before it will hold a car without marking, so plan on parking on the street for a week. Joints are cut the same day as the pour, which is what keeps the shrinkage cracks in straight lines rather than wandering across the panel.
Yes. Both are unincorporated, both carry La Puente addresses, and both are on our way in and out of the city. The only thing that changes is the permit. The county's Building and Safety Division of Public Works issues it instead of the city, and their plan check runs a little longer, so we file it the same week we measure. The concrete, the base and the crew are the same.
La Puente shares its lines with the City of Industry, West Covina, Baldwin Park and the county land around them, and we cover all of it from the same El Monte yard. If your street is on a line, the page next door may be the closer one.
Open the El Monte Office in Google Maps Send the form and we call back within 1 business day to book the measure. The figure is free, and the work carries a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built.