Excavation Contractors in Pittsburgh, PA

Excavation contractors in Pittsburgh work in a city that climbs from 710 feet at the rivers to 1,370 feet on its hilltops, with 800 sets of public stairs and more than a quarter of its 90 neighborhood names point to hills or heights. Few lots are level, and the soil on a hillside is always trying to move downhill. Grading a backyard, digging a basement or trenching a sewer line here means thinking about the slope above and below the job as much as the hole itself.

Landslides are a local problem

The U.S. Geological Survey's 1982 study of the greater Pittsburgh region identified more than 3,000 recent landslides and at least 12,000 older ones in Allegheny and Washington counties. It singled out deeply weathered slopes on red mudstone and claystone in the Conemaugh Group, the so-called Pittsburgh red beds, and found that more than 70 percent of recent slides were tied to older ones. Slopes of 25 percent or more cover roughly a quarter of Allegheny County. The report also said plainly that people accelerate sliding by overloading slopes, cutting at their base and changing drainage. Those are exactly the things an excavator can do wrong, so they are the things we plan around.

Coal under the hills

The Pittsburgh coal seam takes its name from an outcrop high on Mount Washington, where it was mined as early as 1760. It underlies parts of the city and many suburbs, and room-and-pillar mining left voids beneath some neighborhoods. In Bethel Park, for example, state mapping shows the entire borough as undermined. We cannot see old workings from the surface, but we ask about known mine maps, watch for signs of subsidence, and tell you if a deep dig or heavy fill warrants an engineer's opinion first.

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Who owns the pipes

Inside the Pittsburgh Water service area, the property owner is responsible for the entire sewer lateral from the house to the public main, while the utility maintains the main and the wye where they join. On the water side, the utility owns the line from the main through the curb box and the owner owns the rest up to the meter. That split decides who pays for which part of a dig, and we sort it out before quoting. Suburban authorities have their own rules, which we confirm for each address.

Calling 811 first

Pennsylvania law requires anyone digging, including a homeowner on private property, to notify Pennsylvania 811 at least 3 and no more than 10 business days before the work starts. We file the request for every job and wait for the marks.

Weather

The region averages 44.1 inches of snow a season, and January's mean daily low is about 21 degrees. Precipitation runs about 39.61 inches a year. Saturated clay on a hillside is at its weakest after long rains and spring thaws, so major cuts and fills on slopes are scheduled for drier stretches whenever possible.

A typical residential job

• Site visit and look at the slope above and below the work
• Written, itemized price
• 811 locate and any municipal permits
• Access protected: steps, walks, curbs and lawn
• Excavation, with spoil kept off the downhill edge
• Compacted backfill and grading that carries water away
• Hauling and final cleanup

We work in the city of Pittsburgh and across Allegheny County, with some jobs reaching into Butler and Washington counties. Allegheny County alone has 130 self-governing municipalities, the most in Pennsylvania, so the permit office, sewer authority and grading rules can change from one street to the next. The South Hills, North Hills, eastern suburbs and the airport corridor each have their own mix of slopes, creeks and old mine ground. The town pages explain what is different in each.