By Sally Harvey CLT, CLP
Education and Labour Development Department

As landscapers, most of us excavate. I should know, as I have been one for many years. What we forget to do — some of us anyway — is “Call Before You Dig.” Locate identification is the responsibility of all parties that intend to excavate. With all the extensive infrastructure of buried facilities, this is absolutely essential. Calling before digging will prevent utility disruption and potential tragedy. It also proves due diligence on behalf of the landscaper.

Anyone who excavates is responsible to seek out a locate service. Allow at least a week’s notice prior to excavating. Ontario One Call (1-800-400-2255) is an interface between registered utility owners and excavators. The program is here to help us do due diligence and to prevent avoidable crisis.

Excavators must be aware that privately-owned buried utilities may exist within work areas. You should routinely request owners to locate their private underground facilities. On occasion, a property owner may not be aware of any private facilities. This is always a dilemma. Your initial site visit, when quoting or designing a project, should consistently include a visual and physical check for barbecues, swimming pools, outdoor kitchens, fire pits, infrared lights and other features that may be powered by an underground source. Add these items to your site-visit checklist. Make it easy on your estimators, sales people and designers, and at the same time protect us all.

If there is evidence of private locates, ask questions. Ask the property owner for information on the fuel source and type. This will indicate that private locates exist, which means it is time to engage the property owner to ensure that private locates are completed and marked, at his or her cost. Private locator services may be found under ‘Cable Detection, Installation and Splicing’ in the Yellow Pages, or Google ‘private locates in your area’.

Whatever you do, be vigilant! Do not excavate until you receive the proper clearances for all of private and public locates.

Once you receive proper documentation, it is your responsibility as an excavator to verify the paperwork to ensure that the correct property was located, and the paperwork covers the proposed dig area. There have been rare instances when errors were made by the locator. Just like anything in business, it is up to us to make checks and double checks. Ensuring locates and correct locates is no different than verifying and confirming that your landscape product arrives on the site at the proper time to maintain projected efficiencies. Should you have any questions about the paperwork, you must contact the locator for clarification before commencing excavation. Notify the One Call Centre or the private locator immediately if discrepancies are evident.

Once you are cleared by all public and private locators to dig, excavators must observe a tolerance zone: one metre width from the centerline of the located cable or conduit, and one metre from either side of outside edges of the underground facility on a horizontal plane. If excavation is to occur within the tolerance zone, then use precaution by way of hand digging, vacuum extraction methods, and/or pneumatic hand tools, etc. Remember that protection of exposed underground utilities is the responsibility of the excavator during the excavation phase. Don’t leave lines unsupported.

If an unidentified underground facility is found, the excavator should perform due diligence by contacting the facility owner/operator directly and immediately, or through the One Call system.

It is the excavator’s responsibility to notify the utility owner of any damages immediately, as it must be repaired by a qualified professional. Never attempt to repair any utility. If gases or toxins are released into the environment, then the excavator must contact appropriate emergency personnel to prevent injury or danger to the public or property damage. In this event, don’t forget that excavators must take reasonable measures immediately to protect workers, the public, property and the environment.  

Let’s make sure that we continue to excavate professionally:

• Call for public and private locates for every excavation project
• Verify that the locate address is correct
• Verify that the digging area is correct on the locator’s documentation
• Perform excavation outside the tolerance zone as noted above
• Report any damages to utilities immediately
• Prevent tragedy and utility disruption

Any excavation brings the threat of striking underground utilities, and private underground supply lines pose even more challenging hazards. The potential human cost of tragedies caused by utility line damage is immeasurable. The sad thing is, this is completely preventable! Please read, understand and use the Ontario One Call guidelines (www.orgca.com) in the interests of your customers, your employees and our industry.
 

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Sally Harvey can be reached at sharvey@landscapeontario.com