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I recently had a new asphalt driveway installed and after a tremendous downpour, I found there is a high spot in the driveway that caused the rain to pool and back up towards my garage within a foot of the garage door.

What should be done to correct this problem?

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    Contact whoever put it in, they got the pitch wrong. The cheap, easy(relative to other options), and ugly fix is to using a concrete saw and cut a small drainage path.
    – Jason
    Commented Jun 10, 2013 at 14:11
  • I have no idea how deep the puddle is but it is only about a foot from my garage door and if it intensifies it will enter into my garage and then into my living room which has hardwood flooring, thereby ruining the floor, that is why I am concerned about fixing the problem.
    – Adrienne
    Commented Jun 15, 2013 at 6:50
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    I contacted the contractor and asked him to go over the area again with his steam roller to try and flatten the high spot. He is going to try that first but, if it doesn't work, he intends to fill the low spot next to it to push the water in the opposite direction. There is no way to cut a drainage path where the spot is located without cutting into the asphalt and creating a crack which will then create other problems in the long run.
    – Adrienne
    Commented Jun 15, 2013 at 6:54
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    @Adrienne your answer above qualifies.. as THE answer. We encourage self-answers.. They reflect what really happened! Don't forget to accept you own answer!
    – HerrBag
    Commented Jul 10, 2013 at 21:31

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Asphalt driveways are surprisingly flexible when new, and residential driveways are not typically compacted much past 90% — which means there is some flexibility to rework and further compact it.

I corrected a high edge on mine by heating with a torch and pounding it with a 4x4 hand tamper I kept coated in non-stick cooking spray (to prevent soft asphalt and aggregate from sticking to the tamper).

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