Sealcoating and Asphalt in Town of Birch Creek, WI

The 460 homes in Town of Birch Creek span every decade rather than clustering in one: 8.9 percent from before 1940, 27.2 percent from 2000 on, and a steady fill in between. It means we are less willing here than most places to say anything useful about a driveway without seeing it. It also means that if a neighbor was told theirs was past saving, that tells you very little about yours.

Mostly single-family, at 90.7 percent detached, with a small share of duplexes and multi-unit buildings mixed in. That second group is the one where sealing pays back fastest, because a surface carrying six vehicles instead of two finds the edge of its wear layer years earlier.

This is township, not village. There is no street grid in the Town of Birch Creek and no curb to stop the asphalt, which is the single biggest difference between a rural drive and a town one. Without a curb the edge is unsupported, so it breaks away first, and the apron where the drive meets the town road takes the plow and the traffic together. Both are fixable. Neither gets found by looking at the middle of the drive.