Empire Performs Big Asphalt Repair in a Small Amount of Time.

August 18th, 2010

Paving Job Of The Month |Aug 2010

Customer Type:

Property Manager

Project Type:

Retail Center

Project Location:

La Verne California

Scope of Asphalt Work:

Empire was asked to do some asphalt repair including, removing 12 areas of broken & damaged asphalt throughout the center, and replacing it with new asphalt. In addition to that, the customer was looking for some additional skin patching in 4 other areas, and then asked us to re-stripe the lines and legends wherever the new asphalt affected the old parking lot striping layout. In total the work was to be completed in just one day.

The Challenges:

The biggest challenge Empire Parking Lot Services faced on this project was timing and safety. Getting as much of the asphalt removal & asphalt replacement done as quickly as possible while maintaining public safety was our chief concern. The golden rule for us is to try and keep businesses open during the construction process. This center had many small restaurants in it and for them even losing one lunch day can cost thousand of dollars.  Although some projects require us shutting parking lots down overnight, this was one we were confident we could do the pavement repairs in one day safely. The amount of asphalt repair were large but no impossible.


How the Job Went:

As we predicted the shopping center was very busy. By 5 am cars where already pouring into the center from every direction. With a fitness club and a bank on the property, our project site was a first stop for many of the local early morning commuters. We quickly laid out the areas  of asphalt repair and started the asphalt removals on the shopping center by saw-cutting and using a backhoe to remove them. In total the removals were completed in about 2 hours.  Not bad considering there was over 100 tons of asphalt removed and hauled away. Once the old and broken asphalt was hauled off we started prepping the areas to be patched by compacting the surface and tacking the edges of the existing asphalt. By 10 am the hot asphalt started showing up and the asphalt paving process started. We off loaded the new asphalt into the newly prepped patches and spread it with a skip loader. The asphalt is always installed in two lifts when you hire Empire Parking Lot Services.  Some contractors skip this step and just toss the new asphalt in hole and roll it. While this will work some times what more often happens is low spots will form where asphalt was compacted poorly. By installing the new asphalt in multiple lifts better compaction is achieved and  a longer lasting product is whats created. Once the second lift of asphalt was installed the areas where rolled and opened as soon as they cooled to an acceptable level. Empire Parking Lot Services tries to strike a perfect balance between installing a superior paving product, and getting a parking lot open fast for the tenant and customers affected. Once rolled the project was finished and the entire lot was opened up.

About Empire Parking Lot Services

When it comes to asphalt repair, no other contractor cares about you and your property the way Empire Parking Lot Services will.  We give you more quality and value than any other asphalt contractor hands down. We always leave our customers happy and satisfied or we don’t leave at all. It is absolutely imperative for us to do the best we can do on every asphalt repair project that we take on.  If you have an asphalt repair, concrete repair, seal coating, or parking lot maintenance project that we can assist you with than please give us a call.  We would love to serve you today.

Call us toll free at 877-760-2757 or check us out online at www.empirepls.com

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Parking Lot Maintenance Budgeting Guide: Part Four

June 24th, 2010

A Guide to Planning Effective Asphalt Maintenance

(A Parking Lot Maintenance Series Part 4)

The Four Parking Lot Maintenance Budget

When it comes to concrete and asphalt repair there are four distinct types of maintenance considerations. The Seen, the Unseen, Emergencies, and Code changes. In this blog we will discuss the differences in the different types of maintenance planning and how they should be used in creating, managing and building your asphalt parking lot maintenance budget. Read more below about these 4 specific considerations.

The Codes AKA | Ongoing Code Changes to Parking Lot Maintenance

Lastly there are code changes such as the ADA and MUTCD. These codes are constantly changing and can cost a property owner a lot of money if forced to deal with correcting them all at once. The ADA codes that need to be met alone can require some pretty serious expense if a business or property owner tries to do them all at once. To further aggravate the problem every year thousands of lawsuits are filed against property owners and business owners over many times frivolous ADA lawsuits. The lawsuits are filled to force you to comply all at once, or pay a settlement amount of X amount of dollars typically around ten thousand dollars. Business would be wise to create a budget plan to tackle the ADA a little bit at a time instead of waiting for a lawsuit or code enforcement agency from forcing you to tackle the whole thing at once. Some of the items that could be budgeted for over time in regards to ADA changes would include the following.

  • Handicap Ramps
  • Truncated Domes
  • Handicap Sign and Poles
  • Asphalt Grade and Fall
  • Trip Hazards

Orange County Asphalt Repair

About Empire Parking Lot Services

When it comes to asphalt repair and concrete repair no other contractor cares about you and your property the way Empire Parking Lot Services does. We give you more quality and value than any other asphalt contractor hands down. We always leave our customers happy and satisfied or we don’t leave at all. It imperative for us to do the best we can do on every asphalt contracting project that we take on. If you have an asphalt repair, concrete repair, seal coating, or parking lot striping project please give us a call. We would love to serve you today. Call us toll free at 877-760-2757 or check us out online at www.empirepls.com

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Irvine Gets New Asphalt Patch Back

June 7th, 2010

Broken Water Pipe Needs New Asphalt Patch

This week we had a small asphalt patch back that our customer needed done. The project basically consisted of 1 area of (4 “) asphalt that needed to be installed. The owner of the building was moving in this week and he was making some last minute repairs. One of those repairs was a bad pipe behind the building. They had dug up and replaced the pipe and now they just needed to get the asphalt replaced. The total size of the patch was about 50 square feet and the asphalt was in great shape around it. The customer had given us specific directions about building the asphalt up a bit to avoid water puddling against the building in the rain. Take a look at this basic asphalt paving

How the Asphalt Patch Was Installed

We arrived at the project at about 12 noon. It was a vacant building so we knew we had the luxury of scheduling it in the middle of the day. Once we arrived we compacted the soil and base. We do this to be sure we have proper compaction. We do this to avoid air holes and voids that can go onto to eventually form low spots, or worse sink holes. After compaction was completed we poured the first lift of asphalt into the area and compacted it manually. Again multiple lifts are the best way to avoid getting low spots in your asphalt. Once that was compacted we installed the second and final lift into the hole and raked it properly per the customer’s request. Once all of the asphalt was raked in to place we rolled it and used an iron to seal all of the edges. Ironing is critical in having seams that don’t unravel. Strangely enough you hardly ever see other paving companies do this anymore. Once the ironing and rolling was finished we roped off the area and performed a cleanup of any loose asphalt and or mess.

About Empire Parking Lot Services

When it comes to asphalt repair and concrete repair no other contractor cares about you and your property the way Empire Parking Lot Services does. We give you more quality and value than any other asphalt contractor hands down. We always leave our customers happy and satisfied or we don’t leave at all. It imperative for us to do the best we can do on every asphalt contracting project that we take on. If you have an asphalt repair, concrete repair, seal coating, or parking lot striping project please give us a call. We would love to serve you today. Call us toll free at 877-760-2757 or check us out online at www.empirepls.com


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Repair Options for Your Asphalt

April 30th, 2010

What Are Your Asphalt Repair Patching Options:

Asphalt Repair Options, You Have a Choice.

Typically the most common type of repair done these days is the asphalt patch. These patches usually fall under the 2 categories of remove & replace patches and skin patching.  Read below about these two asphalt repair options and learn about which one is right for you. If you have any questions feel free to give us a call.  We would love to hear from you.

The R & R patch.

Remove & replace patches are when a asphalt repair company come out and remove areas of old and broken asphalt all the way down the native soil and then replace that new void with all new material.  These patches are typically saw-cut ahead of time. This process gives the new patch a clean and neat look as well as, improves the bond between the old asphalt surface and your new asphalt patch.  Empire always recommends that you extend your repairs at least 1 foot beyond the perimeter of damaged asphalt being replaced.  This insures that any existing stress cracking won’t continue through to the new patch.

The Skin Patch

This is a very affordable option to the R&R patch.  Skin patching, also known as thin layer patching is basically a very thin patch that is about 1”-3″ in thickness.  Often times, skin patching is used fill low spots on asphalt where there is not a lot of existing cracking or breaking.  The main difference between a skin patch and a remove & replace patch is that the skin patch doesn’t require the contractor to remove any existing of your existing asphalt during this type of asphalt repair.  Typically a skin patch is used to remedy low spots in your asphalt parking lot such as bird baths. These low spots in your parking lot can be caused by a myriad of problems.  Most commonly would be irrigation run off, heavy truck traffic, broken pipes, or just settling asphalt.

About Empire Parking Lot Services

Empire Parking Lot Services is Southern California’s premier parking lot maintenance company.  Every day we help our management customers, contractors, as well as our direct owners with all of their parking lot maintenance needs.  These services include asphalt repair, concrete repair, sealcoating, and parking lot striping.  Empire Parking Lot Services offers top notch asphalt repair to the entire Southern California area.  Our service area includes Orange County, Los Angeles, Riverside County, San Bernardino, San Diego as well as parts of Ventura.  Contact us today if you have any questions about your project you may have.  Empire Parking Lot Services is a fully licensed & fully bonded Southern California asphalt contractor.

Give us a call today

877-760-2757

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Asphalt Repair in Orange County California

March 29th, 2010

Orange County Asphalt Repair Specialist

Small Potholes Patched in Orange County, California.

This week Empire Parking Lot Services worked in Anaheim California on a small asphalt repair project. If you aren’t familiar with Orange County, Anaheim is one of the most northern cities located here.  Anaheim borders  with Stanton to the east and the city of Orange  to the west, as well as Fullerton to the north and Garden Grove to the South. This particular paving project was a small business park that needed to get some rain damage to their asphalt repaired, to hold them over until they could plan a asphalt maintenance budget for the real repairs. Empire specializes in smaller asphalt patching & repair projects like these.  The reason why we get these projects is because we have less overhead and it allows us to bid these projects more competitively then the bigger asphalt contractors in Orange County.

About this Asphalt Project

This project was basically repairing three damaged areas of asphalt in their parking lot with new asphalt patches.  Because these areas of asphalt was so badly damaged and areas of broken asphalt where missing all together, we advised our customer to consider removing the old asphalt by saw cutting the area out and then replacing it with new asphalt material.  If the asphalt where in tact we would have advised a skin patch but the asphalt was allowed to sit damaged to long and removal was the only logical choice.  When we got to the job the first step was to use our saws to cut the badly damaged areas of asphalt out of the parking lot.  These areas where carefully removed and then we tack coated the sides to insure good adhesion of the new asphalt material. Empire always paves every project in two layers a base pave and finish pavement layer.  Once tack coated, we shoveled the new asphalt in and manually compacted the base pave down until it was even.  The reason we pave in two layers is to insure that after the asphalt is installed, that no low areas form from loose material from poorly compaction. We installed the finished layer of asphalt and then rolled it with our roller to proper compaction. As you can see this asphalt repair job came out great.

About Empire Asphalt Repair Services

Empire Parking Lot Services is Southern California’s premier parking lot maintenance company.  Every day we help our management customers, contractors as well as our direct owners with many of their parking lot maintenance needs including asphalt repair.  Empire Parking Lot Services offers top notch parking lot repair and warehouse maintenance services to the entire Southern California area.  Our service area includes Orange County, Los Angeles, Riverside County, San Bernardino, San Diego as well as parts of Ventura.  Contact us today if you have any questions about any project you may have upcoming.  Empire Parking Lot Services is a fully licensed & fully bonded asphalt contractor company.

Call us at: 714-633-0300

Or look us up on the web at www.Empirepls.com

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Driveway Paving & Sealing Services For Southern California

March 9th, 2010

Residential Driveway Maintenance For Southern California By Empire Parking Lot Service

Driveway Repair is different than Parking Lot Repair

Often times we get calls for residential driveway sealing, asphalt repair, and concrete repair.  Empire Parking Lot Services understands that when our driveway customers call they have special needs that are different from the typical property manager & general contractor customer.  For starters when it comes to your home the level of quality needs to be higher than a commercial parking lot.  After all, this is where you live, sleep and entertain your friends and family.  Empire keeps this in mind on every one of our residential driveway customers.  At Empire, we can address all types of issues when it comes to your driveways.  Drainage issues, cracking or faded asphalt, old concrete, or maybe you just want a regulation basketball or tennis court painted in your driveway or backyard. Yeah we do that too!  We offer all of these services and we do them all in house.

Types of Driveway Repair Empire Offers

When it comes to residential asphalt repair we offer a lot of services under that heading.  Our residential services include driveway maintenance as well driveway repair.  If you have an asphalt driveway that is badly faded and in need of sealcoat, we can come out and replace the seal on your asphalt with a fresh coat of guard-top sealer designed to protect your asphalt and extend it’s lifespan.  If your driveway has been badly neglected and its time to rip out the old asphalt we can handle that service as well.  Empire Parking Lot Services can show up and remove your existing asphalt and replace it usually in the same day.  Empire offers a wide range of services such as asphalt, seal coating, as well as striping when necessary.

  • Concrete Driveway
  • Asphalt Driveway
  • Stamped Concrete
  • Street Print

Trust Empire with Your Residential Driveway Repairs

Because Empire Parking Lot Services uses the right equipment and a specialized crew trained for driveway repair, we can offer competitive pricing on these type of repair projects.  Empire serves the entire Southern California area including LA, OC and Riverside and many parts of San Diego and Ventura. Call Empire-PLS today to receive a fast and free estimate on your next asphalt and concrete driveway repair project.

Asphalt Repairs in Costa Mesa / Santa Ana Area

New Asphalt Driveway Overlay in Orange County

Call us today at (714) 633-0300 if your parking lot needs some pothole or asphalt repair!

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Asphalt Repair Schedule For Southern California Parking Lots

February 25th, 2010

The Decision to Repair Asphalt is Influenced by Many Factors:

Top Reasons Why You Should Consider Asphalt Repair Today

  • The level of traffic and effect on your tenants or customers
  • The time until you need a scheduled rehabilitation or a complete overlay
  • Availability of a good paving contractor
  • Optimal weather conditions

Why Does my Asphalt Breakdown?

Asphalt Damage is typically caused by moisture, freeze thaw actions, traffic volumes, poor underlying support, over active irrigation systems or a combination of these factors.  Asphalt Repair operations can be divided into two distinct periods.  The winter asphalt repairs & the spring asphalt repairs.  Regardless of the climate conditions, parking lot traffic volume, or irrigation issues, property managers and property owners must repair potentially hazardous potholes as soon as they become aware of them.  Luckily for us in Southern California Paving is almost a year round service.

The Winter Asphalt Repair Schedule:

The winter asphalt repair schedule should mostly consist of asphalt repairs, overlays and pothole repair. Furthermore, the winter time is a good time to look at your ADA issues and smaller concrete issues.  With the rain and cooler temperatures its best to stick to overlays and asphalt

Jan – March

Asphalt Repair Services

  • Any & All Asphalt Overlays
  • All Pothole Repairs
  • Skin Patching
  • Small Concrete Repair Projects
  • Smaller Seal Coating Projects
  • Smaller Striping Projects
  • Hotels
  • Warehouse/ Distribution

The Spring Asphalt Repair Schedule

The Spring asphalt repair schedule is where you really want to place a lot of emphasis on seal coating and larger maintenance projects.  Because the weather is warm and dry, seal coating projects dry faster and look better.  Also consider you are minimizing your exposure to people slipping in seal, tracking seal into buildings and minimizing the amount of time your parking lot stays closed down.

April – December

Asphalt Repair Services

  • Major Sealcoat Projects
  • Major Concrete Projects
  • Major Shopping Center Repairs
  • School Repairs
  • Major Parking Lot Striping Projects

Empires Asphalt & Concrete Repair Services

Empire PLS has established a crew and special equipment dedicated to addressing these jobs.  This has allowed us to offer parking lot repair including repairing potholes in parking lots efficiently at a friendly price.  Empire-PLS is fully licensed and fully insured.  We are parking lot maintenance experts so, if it’s in a parking lot, we can fix it!

Call us today at (714) 633-0300 if your parking lot needs some pothole or asphalt repair!

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How to Recoginize When your Asphalt is Over Due for Repair.

December 21st, 2009

Asphalt Repair: The Top Three Signs that Asphalt Repair is Overdue.

Property managers and owners have so many responsibilities from day to day that sometimes it’s a miracle that they find the time at all to manage their asphalt repair needs.  So with this in mind, I thought it would be helpful to them and any other parking lot maintenance manager to create a list of the top three things to look for when it comes to their asphalt repairs.

The Top Signs it’s Time for New Asphalt

  1. Cracked Asphalt: This may seem like common sense, but the simple fact is that if your parking lot is cracking, you will soon have a much more serious issue to contend with.  Stated simply, cracking on asphalt is the beginning stage of bigger problems.  Think of it like a tooth with a small surface cavity.  Sure its mostly a visual issue in the sense that the tooth is still strong and you feel no pain however, the reality is that, like the tooth bigger problems are lurking below the surface.  Cracking on asphalt is the first stage of trouble that a much larger and more more expensive problems is coming. The quickest solution to remedy this situation is to seal the cracks and re seal coat the parking lot.
  2. Bird Baths: Low spots in your asphalt or “bird baths” are indicators of a problem that is happening below the asphalts surface.  The main reason bird baths form is that the earth below the surface is moving.  Often times, the earth is not properly compacted before that asphalt is installed and over time gravity causes the soil to start shifting.  In return, the asphalt on the surface will begin to sink, causing the bird bath to form.  Another possible cause is that sprinklers in planters may be leaking too much water under the surface.  This can cause soil  in the surrounding areas to shift and, in return, low spots will form.  When calculating  your exterior maintenance budget, be sure to include a line item for these early warning sign under the heading of asphalt repair.  If treated as they form, it will extend the over all life span of your asphalt parking lot by many years.
  3. Rough Asphalt: Rough asphalt or eroded asphalt is typically caused by not maintaining a structured asphalt maintenance plan.  Another factor may simply be that your asphalt is just really old.  When new asphalt is installed, it has the ability to absorb large amounts of pressure from daily vehicle traffic.  As that asphalt ages, it can lose it’s ability to remain flexible under pressure.  Asphalt typically begins  to dry out after ten years depending on your environment.  Furthermore, if sealcoating isn’t performed on an annual basis, the asphalts ability to remain flexible will be greatly compromised. The best defense is to always include seal coat and striping into your budget at least every other year.  Trying to extend out the maintenance further than that will cause larger problems in the future.
This is how you know its time for asphalt repair

Asphalt Repair "It's Time"

Trust Empire Parking Lot Services for your Asphalt Repair

Empire-PLS offers asphalt repair services throughout Southern California.  Our asphalt repair service areas include: Orange County, Los Angeles County, Riverside County Ca., San Bernardino County, and parts of Ventura & San Diego. Please, take a moment to read more about asphalt repair below.  If this looks like a service you are thinking of having done, please, call us to discuss your project.  Estimators can help you to make sound, educated decisions about your asphalt contracting needs today.

ASphalt Repair Orange County California

Asphalt Repair Southern California 714-633-0300

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Asphalt Repair Specialist for Southern California

December 11th, 2009

Asphalt Repair Company in the Southern California Area

In a nutshell Empire Parking Lot Services is basically a paving company. We chose the name Empire Parking Lot Services because we offer so many more services than just paving.  Make no mistake asphalt is what we do best! Likewise, parking lot asphalt repair is where we shine.  There are many companies that specialize in big highway work.  There are even more that specialize in big road paving installs.  Sometimes these companies like to dabble in the parking lot field but that typically only happens when they are slow.  Empire PLS does parking lot repairs all day every day.  This includes asphalt repairs, concrete repairs, parking lot seal coating, & line striping.

If you have a parking lot in need of any of these pavement maintenance services then call us today.  Here is a partial list of our parking lot maintenance services. Crack seal, pothole repair, seal coating, line striping, truncated domes, traffic sign installation, parking lot sign installation, curb repair, saw cutting, sidewalk repair, ada repairs, parking lot stenciling, flow line repairs etc and the list goes on and on.  Furthermore, we keep the size of our company on the small side to stay competitive.  By doing this we don’t have to take the short cuts on your projects like others pavers do to cover their overhead.  Quality is where we put the emphasis on the asphalt repair projects we do for you.  Empire can also handle all of your parking lot concrete repair needs as well.  We work hand in hand with property owners and managers making sure they stay informed through the entire process.

Call Empire Parking Lot Services next time you have a need for parking lot maintenance in the Southern California area.  We would love to work with you today!

ASphalt Repair Orange County California

ASphalt Repair Orange County California

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Asphalt Repairs “Take the Middle Price”

November 30th, 2009

Asphalt Repairs “Why it’s Smarter to Take the Middle Price”

So you’re looking to get some asphalt repairs on your parking lot and you do the right thing and get three prices from three asphalt repair contractors.  Now all you need to do is pick the lowest priced asphalt repair contractor and run with it right? Wrong.  Read through this blog to learn how to get a closer three bid comparison.  We offer you several tactics for getting the most out of your asphalt repair prices.

How close are Asphalt Paving Repair bids?

When looking at the bids you receive from a contractor make sure that they are bids that can be compared apples to apples.  Many times when looking at multiple bids they don’t all read the same?  Whether its differences in the square footage or changes in the procedure being offered.  You need to get the bids the same across the board.  Letting one of the estimators write the scope for you can help square up the numbers. If there is one that you feel that you can trust more from your initial round of phone calls, maybe let him handle the scope design procedure.  Make sure he knows that you are having him write the scope and for the extra effort that estimator put in on your project you can reward him in one of two ways.  These are fair terms for a paving estimator.

1.)  Let him have last look at the bid.

Or

2.) If that contractor is very close in the running on the price, then consider the extra time he put into creating the scope for you to get the three correct bids.

Don’t Grind the Paving Contractors:

Never try to grind down the price by shopping it back and forth with contractors.  The main reason this is a bad idea is that because what you’re really doing is killing the quality of the project or asphalt repair that you are buying.  It’s like talking the car salesman down on the price of a car.  When he hands you a car with no wheels and no doors it won’t feel like a deal.

Asphalt paving contractors are hungry enough already.  In these current economical times you’re going to get a good deal.  Another thing to consider is that you have a reputation to consider as a buyer as well.  In every industry there are those people who have a reputation for being cheap skates.  These people will get charged more just because contractors know that they will be grind down on the price.

Remember your trying to get the most bang for your buck.   If the paving estimator is wise he will throw in a few extras along the way.  At Empire Parking Lot Service our estimators are trained to look at a project and see what extras we can throw our customers to make them feel good about their decision to go with us and build customer loyalty.  As long as the request isn’t a huge cost we will try and give it to our customers at no cost. Most of our customers have been doing business with us for a long time. Like us we know that we need to expand and shrink with the economy. A prime example might be a few wheel stops replaced or some signs updated for free. This is not something we advertise it something we give well established accounts that we have forged relationships with.

Don’t Get Ripped Off From a Paving Contractor:

When getting asphalt repair prices make sure that you don’t allow yourself to get ripped off.  Most paving companies are honest but beware of con artist.   Some of the paving companies  out there are known for being bad apples. Ask for referrals that are recent and credible.  Here is a list of good indicators of a solid local paving company.

  • They have a website: Now the website itself doesn’t mean there a good company but, it does show a little more effort put in by the company to show you more about them.
  • Look them up on the California State License Board: You don’t have to be a genius to use the CSLB website.  Just point your browser to www.cslb.gov and utilize their “Instant License Check”. Not only can you confirm their license status here but also their insurance, work comp, and bonding information. All in one place how convenient.
  • Google the Company and Look for Bad Press: If someone has had a negative experience using a paving company it will be out there.

Nothing can guarantee that the company you choose is the best match for you.  But these steps may help you avoid the disasters that are out there.  Just look  http://tiny.cc/1c5EU at the current count of 8960 asphalt rip off scam links on Google.  Always get your three prices and stick with companies that have solid verifiable reputations.

Happy Paving!

Asphalt Repair Costa Mesa

Asphalt Repair Costa Mesa

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