Retaining walls · Lock Haven, PA
Retaining walls for slopes, beds and raised patios.
We build segmental block retaining walls in Lock Haven and throughout our central PA service area, from Renovo to Danville. They hold back slopes, raise planting beds, turn steep banks into terraces and carry raised patios, and every one gets drainage stone and fabric behind the block.
- Buried base course on clean 2B stone
- Pipe and fabric behind the block
- Geogrid where the height calls for it
- Engineer’s design for walls over 4 ft
How we build a retaining wall.
The Garden Wall and Terraced Wall Garden packages are built to this spec.
| Before we dig | PA One Call (811), as Pennsylvania law requires |
|---|---|
| Leveling pad | Clean 2B stone, set level for the first course |
| Base course | The first course of block, buried below grade |
| Wall | Segmental block, stacked course by course |
| Drainage | Perforated pipe and drainage stone behind the block, with fabric between the stone and the soil |
| Reinforcement | Geogrid where the height calls for it |
| Top | Caps on the last course |
How a wall goes up.
We dig the trench, set the 2B leveling pad and lay the buried base course to a string line. Every course above sits on that first one, so it has to be straight and level.
The block then goes up a course at a time, with fabric keeping the soil out of the drainage stone behind it.
Our Wacker Neuson EZ36 mini excavator does the digging. With zero tail swing, it can work close to a house, fence or driveway without the back end swinging past its tracks.
Wall packages.
Three wall packages have a fixed price. To try different lengths and heights first, use the retaining wall calculator.
Written, fixed prices for our service area. Each one is confirmed on a free 15-minute site walk before anything is signed. All 12 packages
Garden walls and terraced walls.
A garden wall holds back a slope or raises a planting bed.
On a steep bank, the Terraced Wall Garden uses two walls, the upper one set back from the lower, so one slope becomes two level terraces. It caps both tiers, puts paver steps between them and runs a full drainage package behind each wall; for layouts, see terraced backyard ideas.
For a bed along the house, the Walk & Garden Wall lays a paver walkway in front of a low block wall, with the bed behind it graded and ready to plant. See also our retaining wall for an unstable slope project.
Walls under a raised patio.
A raised patio is a retaining wall with a patio on top, so the wall carries the patio and everyone on it. It gets the same pad and drainage as our other walls.
Our backyard patio and retaining wall in State College pairs the two. For the patio side, from base to steps, see the paver patio page.
Walls over 4 feet.
Walls over 4 ft generally need an engineer’s design, which sets details such as how much geogrid goes in and where. We build to that design.
If your slope needs more height than that, price a terraced pair of walls next to one tall wall. Read retaining walls over 4 feet before the site walk.
Some townships and boroughs want a permit for a retaining wall. Where yours does, the permit is yours to obtain and pay for; we share what we know about it when we walk the slope, and the retaining wall permit guide explains more.
Building walls in Lock Haven.
Lock Haven sits where Bald Eagle Creek meets the West Branch Susquehanna: flat river ground in town, steep slopes above it.
Slopes
Much of the city is flat, but very steep slopes run along the river, on the university campus and along PA 120 toward US 220.
Soils
NRCS soil maps show steep Berks-Weikert shaly soils, on 25 to 60 percent slopes, on the hillsides above downtown, and Linden silt loam on the river flats below.
Floodplain
In the city, any construction in a FEMA-mapped floodplain needs a permit from the Floodplain Administrator, who is the Zoning Officer. Fill there is limited to compacted soil or small rock, and its side slopes can be no steeper than 1 foot up for every 2 feet out.
Rules change. Check with the township or borough before you plan around them; we go over what we know at the site walk.
Wall work.
See all projects
Questions.
What does the drainage behind a wall do?
Water that collects in the soil behind a wall adds pressure against the block. The drainage stone, fabric and perforated pipe in our wall spec give that water a way out.
Why clean 2B stone under a wall when patios get 2A?
Clean 2B stone has the fine particles washed out, so water passes through it at the base of the wall. 2A modified, also called crusher run, keeps its fines and packs into the dense base we use under pavers.
Does my wall need geogrid?
Geogrid goes in where the wall’s height calls for it. It’s a mesh laid between courses that reaches back into the fill and ties the fill to the wall; on walls over 4 ft, the engineer’s design sets where it goes.
Can you build steps into a retaining wall?
Yes. The Terraced Wall Garden package includes paver steps between the two tiers. On a custom wall, steps are priced in the free estimate along with the wall.
What sizes do the wall packages come in?
The Garden Wall runs from 30 ft long at 2 ft high to 50 ft long at 4 ft high. The Terraced Wall Garden has two tiers, from 30 ft at 2 ft high to 60 ft at 3 ft high; anything bigger is priced as a custom wall.
Get a price on your wall.
Tell us about the slope at (570) 397-9800, by call or text, or through the estimate form. We’ll walk it with you, measure and give you the price in writing.