Building up hillside for driveway

[JimR1998]

I want to widen my driveway 4-5 feet for better garage access. Problem is, driveway is already on a hill and I'm not sure how to go about it.

I have 12 feet to work with before the property line and the drop is 5' at most. If I extend out, I'll still have more horizontal distance than vertical (8H-5V). And the driveway won't go to the tippy edge of the extension (maybe 1' in).

I was planning on digging a 3' wide "step" in the hill every 1.5' foot drop (50% grade or roughly 30 degrees if my math is right). Is this too steep? Soil is clay. Should I backfill with anything special or just dirt? Do I need any geo-netting to retain it? We will plant some greenery in the side to help keep it together. And I will slope so that water does not pour over the edge.

Really NOT wanting a retaining wall and lots of what I found online was for serious slopes like cliffsides and such.

I don't have a good picture. Current slope is not uniform. It looks sorta like this textart.

 

[Kevin54]

Cut into the hill further back that you actually need.

Then dig a trence a foot down where you want a retaining wall. Backfill that trench with gravel.

Then get the stackable retaining wall blocks. Every other course, take landscape fabric, and put it on the blocks, then run it back onto the soil and pin it. Then backfill with some more gravel. Repeat until you get to the height you need for the stones. Once you are down a couple layers from being done, throw some landscape fabric over everything, then backfill with topsoil. Fill it up to te top, then either plant grass-seed, or plant flowers behind the retaining wall.

 

[TommyK]

I want to widen my driveway 4-5 feet for better garage access. Problem is, driveway is already on a hill and I'm not sure how to go about it.

I have 12 feet to work with before the property line and the drop is 5' at most. If I extend out, I'll still have more horizontal distance than vertical (8H-5V). And the driveway won't go to the tippy edge of the extension (maybe 1' in).

I was planning on digging a 3' wide "step" in the hill every 1.5' foot drop (50% grade or roughly 30 degrees if my math is right). Is this too steep? Soil is clay. Should I backfill with anything special or just dirt? Do I need any geo-netting to retain it? We will plant some greenery in the side to help keep it together. And I will slope so that water does not pour over the edge.

Really NOT wanting a retaining wall and lots of what I found online was for serious slopes like cliffsides and such.

I don't have a good picture. Current slope is not uniform. It looks sorta like this textart.

Your slope will be approximately 1.5:1 and with clay soils should stand up. However you will want to use something to stabilize it. You can plant grass and use a permanent degradable control blanket for temp stabilization until the grass comes in or plant some other type of ground cover. Fill in approximately eight inch loose lifts and use a vibratory plate compactor to compact it.