Ridgewood paving from Landsdale, about 21 km away
Ridgewood is one of the further suburbs IBP Paving covers, about 21 km from our Landsdale base. We take work here by arrangement and ask for the job details first, so every trip is planned. The work is driveways and crossovers, paths, small courtyards and soakwells, laid by a team with over 20 years in the trade and covered by our lifetime workmanship warranty.
Carnegie in the south, The Vistas in the north
Ridgewood was cut out of Merriwa in 1998 and has two distinct halves. The southern part is the Carnegie Private Estate, built in the mid 1990s. The northern part is The Vistas, developed by Satterley as part of its Brighton Estate. The name refers to the wooded terrain of this stretch of the Swan Coastal Plain.
Across both, homes are mostly single houses on lots between 220 and 800 square metres, typically around 500. That shapes the paving. On lots that size, driveways tend to be short and take up much of the front yard, so the driveway carries most of the look of the house. On the Carnegie side the original pavers are now 25 to 30 years old and due for a first relay. In the back yard, space is tight, so a paved courtyard and a narrow side path often do more for the home than lawn.
Fitting soakwells onto tight lots
Smaller lots make drainage the hard part of the job. The City of Wanneroo requires owners to keep runoff from roofs and paving inside the property, using soakwells, spoon drains or similar. It recommends about one downpipe per 15 square metres of roof, with no more than 12 metres between them.
The City's guide is that soakwells sit back from buildings and boundaries by at least their own width, and it does not recommend them in narrow clearances. Its sizing table gives, for normal rainfall, 580 litres in a 900 by 900 mm unit draining about 47 square metres and 1300 litres in a 1200 by 1200 mm unit draining about 111 square metres. For engineering and subdivision work, specification WD5 uses 1 cubic metre per 60 square metres of hard surface, kept at least 0.3 m above the maximum groundwater level.
On a 500 square metre Ridgewood lot the side setbacks are often too narrow, so we usually place the soakwells in the front or back yard or under the driveway with a trafficable lid. Where even that is short of room, grated drains in the paving can collect surface water and pipe it to a unit with space around it. More detail is on the City of Wanneroo soakwell requirements page.
Crossovers and verges on Ridgewood streets
A brick paved crossover in Wanneroo needs heavy duty pavers at least 60 mm thick, a sand bed of 20 to 40 mm and at least 100 mm of crushed limestone or rock beneath. It must be 3.0 to 6.0 m wide at the property line with a 2 percent fall across the verge, at least 1.0 m from the common boundary and no closer than 7.5 m to a street corner. A crossover must also sit at least 1.5 m from a City tree, though a 0.5 m reduction may be considered. A first crossover can attract a council contribution if you apply in writing within six months of building it; the sheet does not give a figure. Verges may be paved in brick or concrete at a positive 2 percent grade, never gravel, crushed brick or loose stones.
Source: City of Wanneroo, Information Sheet, Stormwater Runoff (July 2019); Development Design Specification WD5 (June 2019); Information Sheet, Crossover Brick Paved, Residential (July 2025); Nature Strip (Verge) Treatment Guidelines; City Tree Policy (December 2024).
Dune sand, Ridgewood Park and the freeway edge
The City of Wanneroo places Ridgewood on the Spearwood dune system, a yellow sand that compacts firmly for paving and usually drains well, with limestone often not far below. Ridgewood Park has a large pond, but away from it there is no major wetland and the water table is generally several metres down. The coast is typically about 3 km away, close enough for light to moderate salt on exposed surfaces, so we favour dense pavers. The Mitchell Freeway runs along one edge with rural Nowergup to the east, and homes facing that open land suit non combustible paving against the house.
Suburbs near Ridgewood
We also work in Merriwa, Butler and Clarkson, and cover Nowergup from this page. See the full list on areas we service.
