Before You Dig! Know What's Below -- Private Underground Utilities
Posted by Erin Mullen on Fri, Jan 27, 2012 @ 09:56 AM
Did you know that it’s the LAW to call 8-1-1, to have your public utilities marked 48 hours before you dig?
And did you know that legislation just passed a new law that if you do not make that first call it’s punishable by a large fine?
You may have not known that you, as a residential homeowner or you, as a commercial property owner “own” private utilities and are responsible and liable for any damages to those lines!
A "public" locate is a locate provided by a utility company for the services and utility lines they own and maintain, whether they are on public or private property. Utility lines are located to the metered point or point of service by the utility company, and each utility company may define exactly at what point their service ends and the private service owned and maintained by the property owner begins.
"Private" locates can begin at that point to detect and mark the location of services owned by the property owner. Typical dissemination points include the meter location, a service valve, a transformer, or even the property line.
Private utilities are our business! We use a mixture of Electromagnetic (EM) Utility Locating, Ground Penetrating Radar, Hand-held GPR, Vacuum Excavation, and Robotic Pipe Cameras to locate your “private” utilities!
What utility lines are typically considered “private”?
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Water lines inside property boundaries.
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Sanitary and Storm Sewer line inside property boundaries.
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Gas lines beyond the gas meter, such as those feeding outbuildings, BBQ's, pools, generators, machinery, etc.
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Power lines beyond the meter, or the site transformer or substation, such as the main service lines into a building from such a point, or sub-services to outbuildings, sub-panels, etc.
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Electrical lines for signage, parking lot lighting, walkway lighting, gates, pumps islands, machinery, block-heater plugs, etc.
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Telecommunication lines (phone, cable, internet, network) beyond the telecom room or dissemination point, such as internal property networks, closed-circuit TV cameras, alarm systems, communication and phone systems, etc.
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Irrigation lines
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Air lines and hydraulic lines for equipment and machinery.
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Fuel and product lines from AST's and UST's, including gasoline, diesel, heating oil, waste oil, etc.
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Fill and vent lines for underground storage tanks.
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Fibre optic lines for onsite communications.
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Any other service or utility line that is owned, installed, and maintained by the property owner as opposed to an outside third party utility company.