Telecom wires under future driveway.

[grsthegreat]

But they are placed where the original grade existed. If he changes grade, it needs to me moved. I know from dealing with frontier here in Idaho…they sucked at the engineering level. I was on a job where a frontier overhead pole, originally installed by verizon, needed to move to allow a new driveway after a lot split. Contractor tried working with frontier for over a month to get them to move it, to no use. Contractor finally removed it himself. Boy that set off a s***storm. Threatened lawsuits, etc.

contractor had records of all conversations and inactions, frontier dropped it. I believe contractor said he was going to file complaint with PUC.

 

[deezler]

Geez.

My concern to this whole project is, are the wire in the right of way next to county/state road, or do they run across your property? If on your property, is there a right of way for them, or did they just do what was the easiest for them? If there is no right of way and on your property, you could make them move at their cost as they weren't put where they were supposed to be put.

If I am reading this thread correctly, the comms lines are running parallel to the road and surely have an existing right of way to do so. OP needs to cut down into a hill to get his driveway started, and thats where the comms lines already run. Sounds like a total headache.

Hand dig and find out for sure before you jump through all the hoops!

 

[milkman636]

My experience is that those lines are not very deep. We had public water go through and I rented a backhoe and trenched 500’ of waterline to the road. I had miss dig come out prior. I stopped about 5 feet from where any marks were and left extra pipe and all the necessary compression fittings in the end of the trench to adapt to the size of water line I buried. The township and their contractor were responsible for the final 8’ or so and the connection to the main.

When I came home from work on tie-in day, there were two phone company guys sitting at the edge of the little pit splicing dozens of wires together in a thick black cable that they had propped up on little stakes.

I went over to take a closer look and the township’s guys had probably hit that line with the first scoop from where I left off. It was only a few inches deep and not exactly where the paint marks were.

The guys working on the fix said someone was going to get a big bill for it. Luckily that wasn’t me. I quit just in time.

In my case the buried line was still in the downhill part at the road’s edge. If I was putting a driveway on it I probably could have carefully skimmed some soil off after it was located and built up a base of 23a limestone over it. It was low enough in relation to everything thing else that it would have taken several inches of base to get a driveway at road grade.

I still have a frontier land line and just went through a week of them dragging their feet to come out a look at a simple problem at the street. The call center is overseas now instead of domestic, and employees seem less enthusiastic than they used to be. I think Frontier may be dying a slow death, and I’m pretty sure that Verizon abandoned responsibility for any local lines when they shipped us over to frontier as customers. Every phone truck I’ve seen on the roadside around us for the last decade says frontier and not Verizon.

 

[JimRB]

Cable company has not marked their buried cable a few times on my property. I have not hit the main line but I dug into the neighbors feeder, or I pounded a fence post into the last 100 foot run. As others have said, local knowledge goes away when folks retire.

 

[grsthegreat]

When frontier bought verizon land systems, thay also acquired all the infrastructure. It was a bad deal for them. All that infrastructure was really old. My wife worked verizon at the time of transition. The mobile side stayed with verizon. Now, at least where i live, Ziply fiber acquired frontiers mess, and there trying their best to fix it, but wont touch damaged copper lines. Their installing alot of fiber up here, just not close to me.

 

[airbiscuit]

A picture would help.

 

[Cycledude]

Around here some of the lines they claimed to have been buried in swamps are just laying on top of the ground, sometimes 50 feet or more away from where they were supposedly buried, they just took the easiest route.

 

[dodge man]

Like already stated, they will probably have to lower them. Sometimes when they locate, they can guesstimate how deep the lines are. My son works for a local phone company and it’s not a huge deal to lower the lines but not easy. They usually run a new line between the nearest pedestals and make it deeper. With directional boring machines it’s a little quicker and easier.

On the odd chance it works in your favor check the courthouse for an easement. Sometimes a savvy landowner will put a clause in that says if it gets in the way it’s on them to move it for you for free. They also might not have an easement which probably means they need to move it.

 

[Fixastuff]

With directional boring machines it’s a little quicker and easier.

Only if there is a bunch of stuff(paved driveways,etc) in the way. In most areas I work I can plow 1000ft of 2 “ conduit 38” deep in less time than it takes my crew to position and get the drill ready to go. That’s not even counting the time of getting water, mixing the mud, etc.

The drill is a great tool to have but quick and easy isn’t how I’d describe it.

 

[Fixastuff]

Also to the op. Find the nearest ped or vault and take a look inside to see if it is direct bury or in conduit. If it’s in conduit they usually leave coil of extra fiber. So it could be lowered, (which you don’t even know is needed unless you give that wire some daylight) without cutting and slicing needed.

There is a fiber line near me that runs from Miami to NY, when you cross it you have to set up a time and someone from the company meets you out there. Dude said the line is 6ft deep and I didn’t need to locate and could just plow over it but I still dug to my depth to make sure. He said 1mil per hour it’s down but I don’t have any idea if that’s true and don’t want to find out.

On the opposite spectrum I found a power line the other day with the first shovel! Was supposed to be 4ft, lol.

 

[airbiscuit]

Around here the power companies follow the far edges of the easement and bury deep. The telephone company follows the path of least resistance (even down the middle of the road), and buried 6" - 36" deep.
Power company will bring in bulldozers to clear trees and stumps so they aren't too close to the road. Telephone goes where it is easy (and usually in the way for road work)

 

[Topzide]

If line isn't buried per NEC code, it's on the company that owns it to get it to proper depth. I went round and round with Comcast. Their contractors were trying to bury at Shovel depth! I kicked them off property and fired up the executive offices about not per code! Low and behold, a crew came out and put in per code. They'll take the easiest route for sure any time they can.

 

[grsthegreat]

Our inspectors here wont enforce any codes on telecom installs……except fiber. Dont know why, but never have. They could care less if they laid it on the ground and covered it with leaves.

for electrical, the pull out tape measures.

 

[caver]

After having the spots marked take pictures of the flagging. Speaking from experience I had some stuff flagged installing conduit for my broken service wires. I still cut a phone line and noticed it but had no idea if it was a legit in service wire. It was my neighbors phone. The phone company repaired it and were cool about it but the tech said it's a good idea to take pictures of the flagging/markings before digging.