Forest driveway entrance terraforming

So hi I am new to the forums. I am living in the forest and I'm having an issue with my driveway

I have a vision of what I see, and I just am unsure how to go about it

You can see in the one picture, my tire tracks turning into the driveway, avoiding the sand area you can see where I drew a line in the sand. I want that to grow in, turn to forest.

In fact the vision goes further, I want that sand, and beyond, the grassy area which you can see how big of an area I'm trying to make grow in. Thicker. Dense.

Where my tire tracks turn in, I imagine in 5 10 years, trees and forest all right where I pointed out, thus making my driveway more closed and more narrow, so I am turning INTO the woods.

What can I do?

I feel like I need to make the sand area higher, maybe poor bags of soil, and then right where the grass starts it's kind of high, I wanna dig that down, and make it go on an angle, toward the forest, to drain rain water away from my drive way which has been eroding because of this issue.

My idea is to reform the area and make it a slight down hill forest

Any idea or tips for me or anything wrong with my logic or anything

I can think of a number of factors to consider:

1. Is this a private road? Where does the part of the road go that is to the left in the picture? Planting trees close enough that the roots could grow into the road and undermine it, might make you quite unpopular!

2. Consider sight lines. Do you *always* come nose out of your driveway? Can you ensure that all delivery people and guests also do so? If not, you may be setting up a dangerous situation as people back out into other cars.

3. Worse than cars, is the risk to bicycles. I gather bicycles are very unpopular in areas of the USA, however, e-bikes are increasing bike traffic where I live enormously - they're fast but quiet, and tend to be right at the edge of the road, so they're more likely to hide behind tall shrubbery.

4. Emergency vehicle access: A big issue where I live is steep and narrow farm roads that aren't passable by our Volunteer Fire Dept Trucks. They also want clear signage so they can find a property in an emergency.

5. Water flow: it looks like the area you've marked is a low spot, probably intended to allow rain to soak in rather than turning your driveway into a swamp. It's too hard to tell from the photos what the elevation gain/loss is. Brad Lancaster has done extensive work on "curb cutouts with rain gardens", so I would consider if such a concept has a place in your plans.

A piece of land we bought has a driveway onto a busy-ish road and they didn't put a culvert in. Not only does the drive closest to the road, end up a muddy mess in heavy rain, the water drains up-slope of the driveway into a treed area which luckily allows much of it to sink and spread, but not all of it. The rest has to cross a grassed area to reach a gully which then drains through part of the property. If we want to develop that treed area with more useful trees, they will have to go up on berms so the roots don't rot, or be tolerant of water. Or we need to find a way to allow the water to cross the grassed area more freely, which likely means some sort of pipe.

I am all for holding as much water on that land as possible, but it needs to be held in a way that still allows us to move where we want to, and since no one will BELIEVE me that driving on that grass in winter is a REALLY BAD IDEA, I've had to repair it too many times already and I'm sick of it!!! The last fellow to do so, should have not only known better, but should have come and got us as soon as he slid down into the soggy area. By the time he gave up, his truck was up to it's axles. No matter what, it was going to be a tractor job to get the truck out, but if he'd stopped as soon as he slid, it would have taken me far less time to repair the damage.  This is the sort of thing you need to be aware of when messing near roadways!

Is part of what you're looking for is more privacy?  It looks as if you can see your house from the road - is that something you're trying to change? If so, I would consider whether  you could change the road just past where the first big trees are with a gentle curve and then tree the old part of the road to make it disappear? Then when you're looking out your windows, or looking forward to getting home, you would wind through trees?

We recently had to hire someone to come out and fix our driveway because rain was taking over.

After paying out the money we have had to make ditches to fix the problem.

If you have not way to building the road higher then ditches on either side would help.

Anne Miller wrote:We recently had to hire someone to come out and fix our driveway because rain was taking over.

After paying out the money we have had to make ditches to fix the problem.

If you have not way to building the road higher then ditches on either side would help.

Yes it is a private road, and I am looking for more privacy so you can't see the cabin from the road.

To the left and right is the road, it extends straight and far in both directions, its all woods, an old dirt road back in the forest

There is never much traffic in and out and people never come like delivery drivers or whatever.

I would make sure people know to drive up the driveway and stay off the grassy area I'm trying to grow.

I want it to be more narrow and private that is the point of trying to do it.

I have other pictures


I don't think it would be an issue for anyone if I grew the forest back in in that spot and ,  and I don't think it'd be more dangerous, it would just give it a driving INTO the woods vibe and driving OUT OF the woods vibe

Here are some threads that might give you or others some ideas for planting trees in the shade:

https://permies.com/t/96868/Shade-Tolerant-trees-privacy-winter

https://permies.com/t/5868/permaculture/growing-Shade

Can you install some steel fencing posts, star pickets in Australia, with some wire mesh and just let the grass and plants grow in that area?