How would you make a semi-permanent walkway/path to a shower in a dirty basement?

[gomipile]

So, title question. The basement is unevenly cement-floored. Circa 1950 plus or minus an unspecified number of decades. For various reasons, the floor doesn't remain clean enough to walk on barefoot.

Any solution must not permanently attach to or mar the cement floor, must not crack when walked upon, must be easy enough to quickly clean to walk barefoot upon with freshly clean feet, and must not float when the basement floods a few inches. Shallow floods are common enough to be notable. Being cheap on top of that would be nice, but I'm not asking for miracles. Just not being ludicrously expensive or difficult to install/reposition would be good enough.

[Thomas Cardew]

Heavy rubber mat, such as an industrial grade kitchen anti-fatigue mat, or garden paving stones and a cheap rubber mat to protect the floor from and scruffs/ scratches from the stones. Both are easy to clean, the stones will be more comfortable, comparable to tile, but slicker when wet, like tile. The heavy rubber mat will be less comfortable, not much give and the hole pattern may trouble sensitive feet, but less slick when wet. Neither should float.

[gomipile]

Heavy rubber mat, such as an industrial grade kitchen anti-fatigue mat, or garden paving stones and a cheap rubber mat to protect the floor from and scruffs/ scratches from the stones. Both are easy to clean, the stones will be more comfortable, comparable to tile, but slicker when wet, like tile. The heavy rubber mat will be less comfortable, not much give and the hole pattern may trouble sensitive feet, but less slick when wet. Neither should float.

I wouldn't have thought of anti-fatigue mat. I used to work night shift cleaning at a place that had the type with a grid of large holes in it. Those were the opposite of easy to clean, and we had to clean them every night.

If I can get them with no holes that are still dense enough to sink in freshwater, that should work.

[Batcathat]

I wouldn't have thought of anti-fatigue mat. I used to work night shift cleaning at a place that had the type with a grid of large holes in it. Those were the opposite of easy to clean, and we had to clean them every night.

If I can get them with no holes that are still dense enough to sink in freshwater, that should work.

If they do float, maybe you can attach metal plates or something to them? Superglue or something like that should still work in water, I think.

[Telok]

If they do float, maybe you can attach metal plates or something to them? Superglue or something like that should still work in water, I think.

Use epoxy or something that specifically says it will bond the metal & rubbers in question. Lots of the more common "superglue" compounds can turn out to have various materials they don't adhere to well, and they often fail when used on flexible objects.

Another thought could be to just put an eyebolt through the corners of the mats and attach a weight.

[halfeye]

Duckboards? Why not just use a bench? why let the walking surface get wet at all?

I probably don't understand the problem.

[Thomas Cardew]

I wouldn't have thought of anti-fatigue mat. I used to work night shift cleaning at a place that had the type with a grid of large holes in it. Those were the opposite of easy to clean, and we had to clean them every night.

If I can get them with no holes that are still dense enough to sink in freshwater, that should work.

We had very different experience cleaning them then. Spray 'em down with the hose, scrub with a long handled stiff bristle brush, and spray it down again, took about 5, maybe 10 minutes per mat tops. That said you can get solid ones, my friend uses these on his garage floor, might want to check the math to make sure they won't float but I doubt it. One cut in half should give you enough to make a decent length path.

[Tvtyrant]

Palettes to jack the path off the ground and then a rubber mat over the top seems like the easiest solution if the floor floods frequently.

[asda fasda]

If the floor is flooding then anything else then stone/tile surface will rott/mold quite quickly and stone/tile in cold basement will be very uncomfortable to walk on especially after hot shower.
Moreover personally I wouldn't walk barefooted on anything in basement that was flooded recently, this doesn't seem very hygienic. I would suggest to use flip-flops as simplest and safest solutions, maybe some elevated shelf near shower in order to ensure that they stay clean during floods, you could have multiple pairs of those near the shower and at the end of basement so you wouldn't need to worry about where you have left them.

The idea of elevating the path so it would not flood suggested on the forum sound good too.

[Mr Blobby]

Why don't we top this 'elevated path' bit with linoleum? Cheap, waterproof, easy to fit and you can get non-slip types to boot.

In fact, if there's head-space and the place only floods slightly, raising the *whole* floor and then covering it might be an idea. Unless you need 'constant access' to clean up the flood, in which lino-covered duckboards might be best.

[LibraryOgre]

My cheap version: Pallets, bricks, and some kind of flooring on top.

Lay down your wooden pallets. Put bricks in them (two lines, middle of each side of the pallet), both to support the boards when weight is put on them, and to weigh down the pallets. Then put some sort of flooring on top (I like rubber mats, but linoleum works), making it easier to clean and easier on the feet. Put some bricks on top of the flooring, too, to keep it from floating away.

[Mr Blobby]

#1: Waterproof pallets before use by using some marine-grade epoxy? They're (normally) good for duckboards, but know from experience they don't last forever.

#2: Can't we seal the bricks/weights within the pallets? Chicken-wire cages, perhaps? Obviously, not so heavy they can't be lifted easily but think only 2-3kg weight per pallet should be enough to stop it floating away...

#3: Top one side of the pallet with some sturdy MDF or something, then top off with the lino?

[OracleofWuffing]

What kind of cleaning would be necessary here? I'm just thinking getting concrete stepping stones- the kind you'd get for an outdoor garden path- and just, uh, put them on the floor. Like, no adhesive or hole digging, the square foot ones are probably heavy enough that they wouldn't float in shallow water. Maybe they might slide around with nothing sticking them to the ground, depends on which direction you're walking and how tightly they're packed next to each other. But moving a whole bunch of concrete tiles to an area to clean them would probably be harder than all the pallet ideas being thrown around, so if there's a mess that can't be solved by running a squeegee across them from time to time, you're better off with those.

[Mr Blobby]

There is also the question on whether you get warning of impending flooding. If you do the pallets can simply be lifted up and hefted out of danger.

Though personally I'd also take a look at if you can work out where/how the flooding is getting in. I once managed to do this with a garage; I never nailed it completely, but did reduce the ingress by some 85%.