Brick Paving Vs Concrete: Which one is better and why?

Brick paving vs concrete-pour short term costs – cost to install.

Although to pour concrete is cheap to install if you compare it with brick pavers, in the long run brick pavers are better. To install brick pavers, you need more time than when you pour concrete. First, brick pavers have to be nicely laid, and gaps should be same size and bricks should fill in the spaces in a neat way. Then the edges of the paving need to be cut to fit in smoothly.

Labour rate to pour concrete and labour rate for brick paving are almost similar. However, due to the longer time taken for brick paving, the total man hours for brick paving is higher.  The first cost of making brick paving can be about 10 – 15% more than when you pour concrete.

Furthermore, when you prepare ground for brick paving  you also need more hours.

Brick paving vs concrete long term costs – To repair and to maintain

Although one may not need to maintain concrete, stains and cracks usually appear over time. After that the eye appeal will be lost. This is not good on the value of your home or office space. The answer will be to stamp the concrete. After that the stains will not be easy to see. However, such additional work will cost money.

When it comes to repairs, as shown above, it is not easy to repair concrete in portions. In most cases, if you treat only a portion of concrete, there will be a shade of colour not same with the rest of surface. Therefore, repairs cost more for concrete than for paving. This is because you need to treat full surface on concrete. In contrast, it is easy to replace a portion of brick paving and still keep the eye appeal of the full surface. Brick paving only need care on joints, which is easy to do. Otherwise they need less effort to maintain. Repeat cleaning goes a long way to maintain brick paving.

Brick paving vs concrete: Durability

Earth movement and changes in heat and cool levels of air may affect concrete surfaces over time. Cracks usually result from this. Brick pavers on the other hand, have enough spaces to allow for these changes with no effect. Pavers can stand load better than concrete before it cracks. Paving bricks will share the weight of load because of the way they lock each other.

Appeal

Brick paving allows a lot of patterns, styles and colour when you design. The eye appeal gives more value to your home or office space.