Blue Stake Prior to Estimate
Blue Stake Your Property Prior To Estimate?
Before any substantial digging can begin on any project around your property Blue Stakes must be called to identify public utilities that may exist. You never know for certain where some of the cables or gas lines may be buried, and besides, calling Blue Stakes is required by law. Plus, better safe than sorry. There can be steep fines for hitting any public works utility when digging was within 24” of the marked utility, or especially if Blue Stakes wasn’t ordered at all.
Besides the fines and penalties that could apply without considering and marking utilities, they can often dictate where your fence line can be placed.
CFC will always order Blue Stakes prior to beginning any project so that we know where the utilities exist. But sometimes by the time your bid is given and contract made for your fencing project and we come to start digging, we find that due to buried utilities the fence line cannot actually be placed where it was contracted. These fence line changes might need to be worked out with adjacent neighbors. The fence line changes will likely add to or subtract from your contract. Those changes and agreements to be made with neighbors could also delay your project.
One suggestion to avoid those potential changes and delays is to have Blue Stakes ordered and your property marked prior to having the CFC estimator come to measure and assess your fence line with you. It doesn’t cost anything. This way, should any utilities present themselves to be in conflict with where you want your fence built, any required adjustments can be taken care of preemptively, rather than when crews are on site and digging post holes.