GRAPEVINE

Grapevine has been here since 1844 and has been building ever since, so the range is wide: an old town centre, decades of post-war neighbourhoods, and newer development around the lake and the airport.

It also sits on the Cross Timbers boundary, where sandier surface soils give way to clay underneath.

Ground close to Lake Grapevine holds moisture differently from ground a mile inland, and houses on the slopes running down toward the water were often built on fill that had to be brought in and compacted.

What the ground under Grapevine is actually doing

Grapevine’s dominant soil is Gasil — sandy, about 17% clay, linear extensibility 1.2. Rader is milder still at 2.5. On the numbers, this is quiet ground.

Quiet ground fails differently. Sand does not swell, but it does wash, and it does carry water down to whatever is underneath rather than holding it at the surface. In Grapevine the problems we are called to are more often erosion, poor drainage and settlement into a void than the classic expansive-clay heave that people expect from a North Texas address.