I’m looking for guidance or similar experiences — not venting — just trying to understand what is typical here.
The city came into our backyard to do work related to the sewer line/manhole located in the easement. The operator knocked on our door and said he needed access and would remove a small portion of fence to reach the manhole. Based on that explanation, I expected something minimal — essentially human access — not heavy equipment and excavation across a large portion of the yard.
They brought equipment through and disturbed a significant area of the yard (photos attached). Turf was removed, soil displaced, and part of our fire pit area was affected. It’s been several weeks and no restoration has occurred.
I’ve contacted the city and they acknowledged receipt of my documentation and said they are gathering information, but no timeline or next steps yet.
For those familiar with municipal easement work:
• Is restoration typically handled automatically, or does it require a formal claim process?
• What level of restoration is normally expected (grade only vs turf replacement)?
• Is it common for access descriptions to differ from actual work footprint?
• Anything I should document or request at this stage?
Approximate disturbed area is ~1000 sq ft.
Thanks for any insight.
by Particular-Ride2405
5 Comments
It depends on the city, most of them are required to repair the dirt, but aren’t required to repair landscaping. Your city could have a different ordinance, but I doubt it.
It is likely to at least be restored to flush with adjacent grades. Municipalities just take forever to do anything, and depending on the type of utility work, might be contingent on testing and approvals before completing the landscape work.
It depends on the language of the easement. Most require at least the ground surface to be restored to how it was prior to the work, which would generally mean level with the surrounding ground and reseeded…but they don’t all require it. The city may not be required to do anything more.
They also may be waiting until spring to restore. Or if there is other utility work elsewhere in the neighborhood they may be waiting until everything is completed and then go back and restore everything (which may be a different contractor).
I would get a copy of the easement document from your title work if you have it, or call your title company. It might cost a few bucks but they should be able to pull it for you (which you can also probably do yourself but might take some figuring out if you’ve never done it before)
Edit: typos
The city left ruts in my front lawn from removing trees on the other side of the road. All I asked for was for them to fill in the ruts and I would plant grass. But because it was on the the other side of the road and not part of the original work I had to jump through way too many hoop to get the equivalent of a pickup bed full of dirt put down.
My wife thought I was bonkers.
Unrelated but did you use cedar fence boards for that raised planter box? It looks really nice!