Arapahoe County runs from the South Platte at Englewood and Littleton east through Centennial and Aurora to open plains. Most of its driveways belong to suburbs that grew up around Cherry Creek and the High Line Canal in the second half of the last century, and each city in it writes its own rules for work at the curb. This page covers both.
Aurora, Centennial, Englewood, Littleton, Greenwood Village, Cherry Hills Village, Sheridan, Glendale and the unincorporated neighbourhoods between them. Aurora also reaches into Adams and Douglas counties, and Littleton spills into Jefferson and Douglas, so the city rules below follow the address rather than the county line. If your town is not named, send the address anyway.
Cherry Creek crosses the county from south to north on its way to Denver. Cherry Creek State Park sits on it at the edge of Aurora, with a reservoir of about 880 surface acres behind a dam finished in 1950. To the west the High Line Canal winds for miles through backyards and greenbelts; in 2024 Denver Water handed 45 miles of it to Arapahoe County to keep as open space. Along the western edge, the South Platte runs past Englewood, Sheridan and Littleton.
What matters for asphalt is less the water you can see than the ground under the subdivisions. The Colorado Geological Survey maps swelling clay soils and claystone under the cities of the Front Range, and names cracked driveways among the damage they cause. In a suburb where every lot has an irrigated lawn, the edge of the drive next to the grass stays wetter than the middle. Heaved edges and cracks that run along the lawn line are common here for that reason, and they get pointed out on the quote with the cause, not just sealed over.
Much of the county filled in quickly from the 1950s through the 1980s, and a street built in one go tends to wear in one go. When the whole block's drives went down the same summer, they turn grey the same year and crack in the same places: the joint against the garage slab, the seam at the sidewalk, and the curve where cars cut the corner of a cul-de-sac drive.
Two practical notes for these streets. A drive that has been sealed many times over the decades can carry a thick, brittle build-up that flakes; that gets said on the quote rather than hidden under another coat. And wide two car drives with a third car pad beside them are common, so it is worth measuring the pad as well before comparing prices.
The apron between the sidewalk and the street, the curb and the public walk are right-of-way, and every city here that we checked controls who may work on them. From each city's published pages:
None of these cities lists sealing a driveway on private land as permit work. Apron replacement only goes ahead where the paving contractor already holds that city's license or bond. Fees change, so the current figure goes on your quote.
Sealing on your own property is not a right-of-way job. Centennial does license asphalt contractors, so the license is checked before the job is booked.
Littleton treats an extra access point on a single family lot as its own permit, so it is a question for the city before it is a paving job.
Usually wet clay swelling under that edge, fed by irrigation. Moving the sprinkler spray off the asphalt is part of the fix.
Aurora's rules follow the city, whichever county you are in. The Adams County page covers the cities to the north.
Neighbouring counties: Denver to the north west, Douglas to the south and Jefferson to the west.
