Parking Lot FAQ: Question #1

As the adage goes, babies don’t come with a manual, and sadly parking lots don’t either! If you are embarking on your first parking lot project as a property or facilities manager, you are probably really wishing your parking lots came with a manual right about now.

Or for those of you seasoned in the business, you may be wondering if there are holes in the hodgepodge of information you’ve picked up over the years. You’ve talked with lots of different contractors and none of them seem to give the same answers to your question. You're left more confused than when you started the conversation and wondering who to believe.

Sure, maybe you could nerd out on pavement and take a contractor certification that would get into the nitty gritty of asphalt and concrete technical jargon, but you don’t want to be a pavement contractor.

What Do I Need?

What you need is the nuts and bolts, down to earth actually helpful information about how to manage and oversee a parking lot construction project.

• How Long Will This Thing Take?
• How Will A Parking Lot Project Affect My Customers?
• How Can I Make Sure I Get What I Pay For?

We’ve got you!

We’re here to answer your questions about asphalt and concrete and to help you get clarity on what it looks like to manage a pavement project. We’ll share with you some good questions to ask your next potential contractor that will give you some insightful information on what you can expect when working with them, some basic industry knowledge so you can see when your budget dollars were well spent, and hopefully give you the confidence that comes with getting out of the dark!

We can’t (and you don’t want us to try to!) give you all the information you need in one short post, but to start, we’ll answer one question that can help any property manager set their project up for success.

What is the first thing I need to know to help get my parking lot project off on the right foot?

‍The short answer: Start early. Real early…Really.

The long answer: Some of the industry's best players have been around for a long time and their schedules fill up shortly after the start of the asphalt season (if you’re in a state where it gets cold during the winter, this is around the time the daily low is about 50 degrees.)

Starting the bidding process early gives you time to learn some of the jargon in real time and it helps ensure that you aren’t calling a bunch of contractors who can’t fit you into their schedule for the year.

If you’re reading this and thinking, “Crap. Well, that’s done and gone,” you’re not alone. Check out our ebook “How to Get Three Bids Fast” for a guide to getting proposals when you’re under the gun.

At Diamond, we’ve flipped the current model on its head to ensure that we are ready for any project at any point in the season (weather permitting, of course). So, if you’re looking to get a project done and you’re on a tight deadline, give us a shout! We’d be happy to get your project started off on the right foot.

Stay tuned for our next posts in our FAQ series where we’ll dive deeper and answer the bulleted questions above!