Our team at Renegar Construction specializes in building boat houses, docks, and other shoreline structures. We commonly use rip rap, a material made of crushed stone, to construct reliable seawalls and barriers throughout the region.
There are several properties of rip rap that make it ideal for shoreline structures, and in this article, we’ll explain a few key places where we might use this material.
- Erosion Control – One of the reasons why rip rap is used so extensively in shoreline construction is because it is excellent at reducing erosion. The material is available in a wide range of sizes, so walls made of rip rap can be customized to suit the conditions at each point along the shore.
- Road Construction – Rip rap is also an excellent base for roadways and parking lots. If you want to build a road to provide shore access, then rip rap is a great choice of material. The larger sizes might not be suitable for this purpose, but R3 and R4 rip rap are perfectly sized, with stones ranging from 3 to 6 inches in diameter.
- Pedestrian Guidance – Our team also uses rip rap to direct foot traffic along shorelines. Many coastal areas have ecosystems vulnerable to erosion, especially erosion caused by human foot traffic, so it’s important to direct people away from these delicate areas. We do this by placing larger rip rap at the edges of paths; the large, irregular stones send a clear signal not to walk in those areas, which keeps people on the smoother walkways.