If you are looking into developing property, especially if it involves cutting in a road, you should at least contact Griswold Engineering for site design advice and planning. We believe in using the existing grade as much as possible to help with rainfall runoff. Instead of crowning a road, or pitching the road into the hill, creating a channel, we recommend considering cross-cutting low-speed roads to the downhill to shed the runoff better. Water simply cascades off to the downhill side. This requires fewer ditches, and provides better slope stability. We recommend a minimum 2% cross-slope to the downhill.
This road was cut in Spring of 2019. It’s still raw, but you can tell it has held up well with some very large rainfalls. No scouring of the riding surface, nor rutting has been observed. Since this is a low speed driveway, a super-elevation is not required to maintain high speeds.