Eau Claire, WI · Northwestern Wisconsin Open now (715) 450-9897

Asphalt Repair and Patching in River Falls

Asphalt Repair and Patching in River Falls, Wisconsin.

Pothole, patch and sinkhole repair for commercial lots in River Falls. Saw-cut square, the failed base dug out and rebuilt, the patch compacted flush and the joint sealed.

4.7 from 21 Google reviews

About an hour and twenty minutes west of Eau Claire on I-94 and Highway 35. The estimate is free.

A Bobcat skid steer beside two saw-cut sections of asphalt on a commercial parking lot, work area coned off while cars stay parked around it.
4.7 Google ratingFrom 21 reviews
7 days Sinkhole to finishedFrom a 2026 review
Full Depth patchingNot a skim over the top

Working in River Falls

The corporate parks northwest of town take the truck traffic, and the Radio Road interchange put them straight onto Highway 35, so freight reaches them without coming through the city. Whitetail Ridge alone has around a dozen businesses and an estimated 400 employees on it. Where a lot has failed in a driving lane it's the base that's gone, and a patch laid over it comes back in the same spot the following spring. That area gets cut back square to sound asphalt, dug out to something firm, rebuilt and compacted, then hot mix rolled in flush with what's around it.

From our jobs

Job Photos

Two fresh asphalt patches laid in a worn parking lot, cones still around them
Full-depth patches laid and coned off
A crew member kneeling at a stall line working patch material by hand
Hand work at the stall lines
A fresh full-depth asphalt patch coned off in a commercial lot outside an industrial building with dock doors
A full-depth patch outside the dock doors

All job photos

Filled vs. repaired

The pothole that comes back every spring is being filled rather than repaired. Cold patch is a temporary measure and an honest one when it's sold as that: it's loose material tamped into a hole, with no bond to the sides and nothing done about the failed base underneath. It gets you through a winter. A real repair means cutting a clean square back to material that's still sound, taking out everything soft below it, putting the base back and compacting it in lifts, then laying hot asphalt and rolling it. The patch ends up stronger than what is around it, which is why the failure doesn't come back through the middle of it.

Filled

The quick version

  • Cold patch tamped into the hole as found
  • Ragged edges, so there's nothing to key against
  • Failed base left in place
  • Back within a season, usually wider

Repaired

What we do

  • Saw cut to clean vertical edges, back to sound asphalt
  • Soft material dug out until the bottom is firm
  • Base replaced and compacted in lifts
  • Hot mix laid, rolled, and the joint sealed

Cold patch has its place: it's the right call in February when nothing else can be done. It's the wrong call in July.

Repair or repave?

Most lots that get deferred don't need repaving.

What we look at before quoting either one.

  • Two or three potholes, the rest of the surface is soundStraightforward patching. Nowhere near needing an overlay. Repairable
  • The garage apron has sunk where it meets the concreteCommon and fixable. Usually settlement under the transition, cut out and rebuilt. Repairable
  • Cracked into squares in a few areas, sound elsewhereCut those areas out full depth, patch, then seal the whole surface. Repairable
  • That squared cracking across most of the lotThe base has gone broadly. Patching it becomes a rolling cost with no end. An overlay or a rebuild is the answer. Needs replacement
  • Water sits in the same spot after every rainGrade or drainage, and it has to be solved before any surface work, or the new surface fails in exactly the same place. Depends, send a photo

Photos of the worst two areas are usually enough for us to tell you which it is.

What Decides the Price in River Falls

Repairs are priced by area and by how deep the trouble goes, and the depth isn't knowable until it's open. These are the bands most jobs land in.

Single pothole

Up to a few square feet

Measured on site

  • Saw cut, dig out, base, hot mix, compact
  • Cheaper alongside other work

Sinkhole or subgrade failure

Depth unknown until opened

Measured on site

  • Often a drainage or utility problem underneath
  • Assessed and quoted before the machine moves

Several repairs on one visit come down substantially per repair, because getting the machine and the crew on site is most of the cost of a small one. If you have three, have them all looked at.

How the Work Goes in River Falls

Same method on a driveway apron and on a loading dock approach.

Find the edge of the failure

The visible hole is smaller than the damage. We sound out where the surface is still supported and cut outside that, not around the hole.

Saw cut square, clean vertical faces

A patch cut tight against a clean edge stays. A patch feathered against a ragged one fails at the joint, which is why so many patches fail in a ring.

Dig out to something firm

Everything soft comes out. If the bottom is wet, that's a drainage problem and the best patch in the world won't last sitting on water.

Base back in, compacted in lifts

Compacted in layers rather than dumped and rolled once. This is the invisible step that decides whether the repair lasts two years or twenty.

Hot mix, rolled, joint sealed

Laid to the surrounding grade so water still runs where it's supposed to, compacted, and the perimeter joint sealed against the next freeze.

Questions We Get in River Falls

What River Falls calls us about, answered straight.

More questions answered
River Falls is off the interstate. Do you still come out here?
Yes, for commercial lots. It's about 63 miles from Eau Claire, an hour and twenty out I-94 and down Highway 35, and the city itself is about five minutes off the interstate. Send the address and what the lot needs and we'll set up a time to walk it. The estimate is free.
How much does pothole repair cost?
Square footage and depth, mostly. A pothole that stops at the surface is a different job from one where the base underneath has gone, and you cannot tell which you have until it is opened. What we can tell you before that: several repairs done on one visit come down substantially per repair, because the trip and the mobilisation are already paid for. The assessment is free.
Why does my patch keep failing?
Almost always because it was filled rather than repaired: no clean cut, no removal of the failed base, and nothing bonding it to the asphalt around it. The failure was underneath and it's still there.
Can you repair a sinkhole in a driveway or lot?
Yes, and quickly. Our newest review is a sinkhole repaired within seven days. A sinkhole means material is being washed out from underneath, usually by drainage or a failed pipe, so the repair includes finding out why.
Is it cheaper to repair the asphalt or repave it?
Repair, until roughly a quarter to a third of the surface has failed. Past that you're patching patches and an overlay becomes better value. The estimate measures how much of your surface has actually failed.
How soon can we drive on a new asphalt patch?
Hot mix takes traffic as soon as it has cooled, usually a few hours. That's the material rather than a schedule: what a specific repair means for your lot is one of the things the estimate works out.

The Lots and Surfaces in River Falls

River Falls is a city of about 17,800 straddling the Pierce and St. Croix county line, on the Kinnickinnic River south of the interstate. It's about 63 miles from Eau Claire, an hour and twenty minutes out I-94 and down Highway 35, and the city puts itself five minutes off the interstate and thirty from downtown St. Paul. Highways 29, 35 and 65 all serve it. The University of Wisconsin-River Falls is here, with about 5,300 students.

Four named parks hold the industrial ground. Mann Valley Corporate Park on the northwest side is the biggest inside the city limits, more than 200 acres zoned for office and light industrial with a single 155-acre lot in it. Sterling Ponds Corporate Park has four lots left over 15 acres, Whitetail Ridge Corporate Park has two lots over 12.5 acres with roughly a dozen businesses and an estimated 400 employees already on it, and the older River Falls Industrial Park has a three-acre lot and an area zoned heavy industrial. The Radio Road interchange, built in 2014, puts all of them straight onto Highway 35.

The rest of the commercial surface is the campus and the hospital. UW-River Falls runs about 5,300 students and opened a science and technology center in 2026, the largest construction project in the university's history. Allina Health's River Falls Area Hospital is on East Division Street, with two more clinics in town. River Falls High School is on Cemetery Road with about 1,100 students, and Chippewa Valley Technical College has a branch campus here. Foley United, Interfacial Solutions and Rush River Brewing are among the businesses the city puts on its own site.

Where we work in River Falls

  • Mann Valley Corporate Park
  • Sterling Ponds Corporate Park
  • Whitetail Ridge Corporate Park
  • River Falls Industrial Park
  • The UW-River Falls campus

Around River Falls: The Kinnickinnic River through downtown, Glen Park and the swinging bridge, Hoffman Park, The Falls Theater, The Falcon Center on the UW-River Falls campus.

17,802 people, 2024 Census estimate.

The Pierce County soil survey puts the largest areas of sandy outwash in the valley of the Kinnickinnic, and Waukesha silt loam, a terrace soil laid down as stream terrace and outwash, occurs principally in the township of River Falls. Sand and silt loam don't hold water the same way, and a lot can have both under it.

Get a Free Estimate in River Falls

Tell us what it looks like and we'll come measure it. You get a written price before anything starts.

(715) 450-9897
  • Free on commercial lots and properties in River Falls
  • A photo of the problem helps, and it can go in the message
  • Surfaces that are not ready yet get told so at the estimate

Get an estimate

Send the form and we'll call you back. The estimate is free.

What can we help with?