Features

Wide area locates

You are familiar with the locate request for intent to excavate in New Mexico. Call before you dig is becoming part of our culture. But there are other types of one call tickets available to you. One such unique ticket is the wide area conference and locate.

This conference and locate procedure is designed for handling large area or long term projects that will take longer than ten working days to complete. The process starts with the project owner or the excavator calling the one call center and any non-member facility owners to request a wide area conference. Obviously, having to determine whether a utility in conflict is a member of New Mexico One Call creates additional burden on the excavator and increases the potential for damage. When contacted, the facility owners have two working days to contact the project owner to schedule a conference.

The intent of the conference is to open a dialogue between stakeholders impacted by the project. The conference is the time to work out scheduling conflicts and other issues of importance to the stakeholders. Listed below are some of the recognized benefits of the conference working as it was intended.

• Opens up and maintains communication between the contractor and locator.
• Communication results in more efficient scheduling of locator’s time (locators are spread thin as it is – this helps with their scheduling and possibly eliminates spotting where not immediately required due to the inherent flexibility of the process).
• Communication results in better quality of line spotting for contractor (spots applied and refreshed as needed to keep production going).
• Process enhances overall damage prevention efforts.

At the conference, a written work plan will be developed between the project owner and each facility owner. It shall be signed by all parties. It is critical for the ultimate success of the project and for the protection of all stakeholders that the written work plan be signed. It becomes the legal document for the project, and should there be issues at anytime during the project, it will be the document of record.

Obviously, if the process is not followed properly, it can result in a lot of frustration for the locators and contractors. To be sure, there is significant paperwork required to keep work plans current, but will be essential should problems arise.

It is critical to the overall efficiency of the project that the locators and/or all utility facility owners promptly respond to the contractor’s notice and more importantly attend the wide area conference.

When the project is ready to begin, the project owner will contact the one call center and any non-member facility owners and request a wide area locate. The project owner must provide the ticket number that was issued for the conference by the one call center and any non-member facility owners. The excavation ticket will reference the conference ticket number and cite the work plan as the description of the work to be performed.

Updates or revisions to the work plan shall be in writing and signed by all parties. The wide area locate ticket must be reaffirmed every ten working days to maintain a valid ticket for the duration of the project. If there is no call for reaffirmation, the ticket will be considered to be complete.

Unless the excavator states that the existing markings are sufficient for the time being, the facility owners shall verify that existing markings are still visible, refresh them if needed, and continue to locate according to the work plan.

The wide area locate process as adopted under PRC rule-making may not perfect, but if all parties seek to work together, everyone wins.