Digging safely - Excavation guidelines for working within buried utilities
Here you will find guidelines for locating and safely working around underground utilities, including Cochrane potable water, sanitary sewers, storm sewers underground infrastructure.
Everything you need to know about digging safely
Excavators must follow all the legislation and regulations applicable to their work, agreement, or contracts with owners. Before starting excavation, excavators must obtain all municipal approvals, crossing agreements, and proximity agreements as required. Locate requests and approval documents must always be available on site.
Each individual utility owner reserves the right to change their procedures and processes regarding their infrastructure and networks.
Why do you need a permit When planning a construction project, start with a permit application from the Town of Cochrane. Permits provide significant value to the municipality, the applicant and to neighbours by providing a level of certainty to work being done.
Permits are the result of years of experience, testing and feedback. Having proper permits helps ensure the project proposed is safe and inline with Cochrane bylaws, like the Land Use Bylaw, and the requirements of any other applicable legislation.
Building permits Town of Cochrane Safety Codes & Inspections 403-851-2572
When working within buried utilities, practicing safe ground disturbance is critical to avoiding personal injury, costly damage and service disruptions.
Request a utility locate through Utility Safety Partners. Excavation must be completed within the pre-determined work area submitted in request.
Review locate documentation and markings. Contact the Town of Cochrane if there are any discrepancies between the locate request field markings and the locate request request document.
Prepare the work area. Secure the excavation area with barricades during work and while the work site is unattended.
Hand dig or hydro-excavate infrastructure to determine the exact location and depth of underground utilities within the excavation area before using mechanical excavation equipment.
Mechanical excavation equipment should only be used in combination with a spotter.
Only excavate with mechanical equipment parallel to exposed buried utilities no closer than 0.3 meters (1 foot) in any direction from the exposed infrastructure. The use of a toothless bucket is recommended.
When trenching parallel and in proximity to buried facilities, the excavator is required to place supports along the entire length of the area to prevent them from collapsing.
Excavation where buried infrastructure is exposed must be backfilled with clean granular material. Backfilling should be performed without the use of specialized tamping equipment when directly on the exposed infrastructure.
When a utility locate request is submitted, the locator will provide markings at infrastructure with blue (water) and green (sanitary & storm) paint, flags and/or stakes. A locate request completion document will be provided along with additional supporting documents as required.
The excavator is responsible for reviewing the locate request and ensuring that it matches the field markings on site. Before beginning excavation, compare markings to locate documentation and contact the Town of Cochrane Operational Services if there are any discrepancies between the locate request field markings and the locate request document.
Most locates are valid for up to 30 calendar days, or 60 calendar days for larger projects with written agreement. All excavation must take place within the defined work area and locate markers must be maintained by the excavator. If the ground disturbance is not completed within the maximum timeframe or marking are removed or damaged, the excavator must submit a re-locate request.
Hand digging is required within 1 metre of any locate marker. Do not probe for buried infrastructure with pointed tools such as bars or pick axes. Use dull-edged or rounded shovels. Never use your entire body weight on the shovel while hand digging. Dig at an angle so that any contact with infrastructure would be a glancing blow rather than a direct hit. Approved hydro-excavation may be used as an alternative to hand-digging and must only be conducted by qualified operators.
