Interlocking Driveways in Applewood

When Applewood Acres and Applewood Heights were laid out in the 1950s and 60s, a household with one car was normal, and plenty of the original driveways still show it: a single lane of asphalt running to a carport or a one-car garage. Now there are two or three cars, and the extra ones end up on the lawn or on the street overnight. Widening is the usual reason owners of these brick bungalows and back-splits start looking at interlock.

How wide you can go is not a matter of taste in Mississauga. By-law 0182-2024 ties the maximum driveway width to lot frontage: 3.0 m when the lot is under 6 m wide, 6.0 m for frontages from 6.1 to 16.9 m, and 8.5 m once the lot reaches 17 m. The deep, wide lots in this part of the city often land in one of the two upper bands, which leaves room for two cars side by side, but we measure rather than guess. The width checker on this site gives you a quick answer before the visit. Going past the limit means a minor variance from the Committee of Adjustment, which takes time.

The other constraint is trees. Older streets near Dixie Road have big maples and oaks close to the road, and some stand on the City boulevard, right where a widening would cut through roots. Street trees belong to the City and Mississauga also has a private tree by-law, so digging near a large trunk is planned, not improvised. Many renovations here replace the original poured concrete front walk at the same time, which lets the walk, the steps and the wider driveway share one base and one paver.