Driveway damage drama and advice needed!

Hi all,

Any advice or considerations would be appreciated.

A crane drove onto my driveway and caused the driveway to collapse REALLY BADLY once it got down near the garage. My neighbour hired the crane to remove three large palm trees from his backyard. The neighbour was there when it happened, not me.

• The first quote for a new driveway is $8000 to fix about 45sqm of driveway. I've got two more quotes coming
• The crane operator left without warning and without providing insurance details. I spoke to him and he's unwilling to take full responsibility and only offered partial assistance. ie. he'll excavate the broken concrete, but I need to pay for skip bin, concrete, the reo, and the concreter. I'm not happy about that.
• The tenant is vacating and the removalists are coming on the 19th October
• The building insurance is with Terry Scheer. The claim will take 7-10 days to review and at first glance, I'm not hopeful
• My family lawyer thinks a letter of demand approach would be costly and time consuming.
• I've spoken to my neighbour about chipping in some money as it's obvious now the driveway can't support the 20T crane he needed. But he's not too happy about contributing either.

Two questions to y'all in order of priority

1. What are quick ways to make the driveway safe for the tenant? My neighbour says he can smash up concrete with a sledgehammer. Rubber mats?
2. Any approaches on dealing with the crane operator. He has insurance but blames my neighbour for not telling him about the driveway damage. Also, I found out his excess is $5500.

Any advice or opinions would be appreciated.

 

I was really angry on your behalf when I read the story but then looked at the photos and this is way more nuanced.

The driveway and concreting hardly looks fit for purpose and is more reminiscent of those jungle traps from the movies. A big hole with spikes on the bottom and a few palm fronds and dirt on top.

Tbh I’d DIY a letter of demand for the full amount, go back and forward a bit but be pretty happy if you could settle for 4k.

I’m presuming you consented to them accessing btw.

 

That's the usual process. Why have you taken so long to lodge your claim with TS.?

Who cares what the neighbour's/crane excess is, that's their issue.

Who agreed to allow the crane onto your property onto unreinforced path? (it isn't a driveway by any standard). Insurer may have contributory claim for allowing them onto the path.

 

That isn’t a driveway - not thick enough. Though they are very common in older houses. Mine got cracked by a tow truck when it had to ‘shake’my car off the tray when the gear cable snapped locking it in park!

If insurance refuses your claim, and it’s just broken by the garage, then get a handyman to mix up a few barrows of concrete and just repair the broken section.

 

Yep, this is where most of the liability is.
But also the crane operator should have been able to see that (60's style) driveway would NOT support his 20T crane !!!
I'm with just lodging for insurance

Edit: Don't expect that insurance will cover all the replacement cost.
Your old driveway is/was not up to standard.
If insurance covers 40% of replacement cost I'd take it !
Leter of demand for $8k then compromising back to $6k (or even $5k) will be better than claiming insurance (then replace damaged driveway and add the $8k cost to depreciation).

 

I was thinking the same... it actually looks like pavers rather than a concrete driveway as such.

Goodluck to the OP, as others have said try your own insurance company first and let them.worry about it.

 

Looks like the quickest way to get the palms out won't be the quickest afterall.

 

Your own insurance first 100% and if you don't have insurance you've got the hard road of their insurance, and if they don't have insurance, then the harder road for xCAT, which I actually don't think you would be successful because [assuming] you gave permission for them to use your driveway and they had lawful access, [it would be taken that] you would have assessed if your driveway was ok to handle the crane as part of your decision making process when deciding to grant approval for them to access or not.

 

Have a driveway like that, no reo and got trashed when I had some renovation work done at my place. Get some crushed gravel or road base from a landscape supplier, can use that to fill in the gaps for now. But yeah long term you need to change that driveway

 

When Sydney Water came out to replace a vent stack on our property, they took dilapidation photos before and after the 50t crane.

If the crane operator didn't do this they are just as responsible as they have far more experience than the OP.

 

I'm getting an existing driveway removed and replaced over the next 10-14 days, yesterday I took photo's (time and date stamped) of both side's of the ROW entry, my house corners, entry tiling, garage slab entry and surrounding rock walls, all so I have proof of any difference or damage done during the process.

I expected that the contractor will be doing the same prior to bringing in any equipment or heavy vehicles to prove what if any damage was existing so a bogus claim can't be made against them.

Mad if you don't these days (given how easy it is to pull out your phone and go click)

*I do it with tiled path area's prior to mowing even !

The crane driver must have been blind or stupid to drive onto the path, so many members here can see the area wasn't up to the task !
They teach you all about ground stability and stabilization when you do the course to obtain the qualification (I still hold my crane drivers ticket).
In this case is it possible the tenant said "it'll be right" or even signed a waiver because I don't know anyone silly enough to drive a 20T (lifting capacity, not actual crane weight) onto that driveway ....

 

Still no answer as to who gave permission for the use of the driveway ...

 

Any crane driver with half a brain would have known that the concrete path would have crumbled under the weight. He just wanted a quick job for himself and didn't give a rats.

Maybe some blue metal would be a temporary fix for crumbled old driveway. About $100 per tonne.

 

How does taking photos make them responsible or not for paying to fix it?

Even if the before photos show it unbroken and the after photos show it broken, it doesn’t sound like a dispute about who caused the damage - more who is going to pay. It sounds like everyone agrees it was the crane.

I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a disclaimer in the crane drivers agreement!


To be fair, very few property owners would realise their driveways were not strong enough. It was a surprise to me that the tow truck damaged mine. Now I’m (ahem) an expert!

I wonder how much the neighbour sold the palm trees for?

 

Just as a condition report not for excusing liability.

 

If I were giving permission to access my property for something like this (or any other access really) it would be on the proviso that any damage is their responsibility.

Having said that, I wouldn't expect the crane driver to pay for a driveway of better spec than the one damaged - so not the full $8k quote.

 

As others have said, that was never a proper driveway, and was full of cracks before the crane drove over it. It looks like it was originally the old two strips of concrete with grass between and someone has filled in the middle and each side at some point.

I reckon you would struggle to get anything from insurance as it was in a poor state before the crane entered.

Tools

 

I'm with you on this one. The OP shouldn't have to deal with any of this, or be out of pocket AT ALL. Whether or not the driveway is actually (structurally) considered appropriately constructed by today's standards etc is irrelevant. The OP didn't employ the crane operator, and the work being done wasn't at the OP's address.

If the neighbour's tradie hadn't driven onto the OP's property, none of this would be an issue for the OP. The neighbour and the crane operator need to sort this out - shouldn't be on the shoulders (or the insurer) of the OP.