Earlier this month, the Common Ground Alliance released their 2023 Damage Information Reporting Tool (DIRT) Report. The report, released annually, gives an in-depth analysis into the state of underground utility damages and what steps stakeholders should consider when attempting to reduce damages.
According to this year’s DIRT Report, 76% of damages are caused by six root causes: failure to notify 811, excavator failed to maintain clearance, facility not marked due to locator error, improper excavation practice, lines marked inaccurately due to locator error and excavators commencing digging prior to verifying via potholing. These root causes are consistent issues with the utility excavation process, and they have been the top six causes of damages for the previous three DIRT Reports.
This year’s data also found that contractors frequently face project start delays when attempting to start a project, with contractors facing what amounts to be a coin toss in expecting whether or not they will be able to start work by the ticket’s start date. The report states that data tracking is necessary for correcting this issue, and that 811 call centers must play a key role in developing a standard metric for tracking ticket delays.
The 2023 DIRT Report also makes several recommendations for stakeholders that aim to improve locating practices to achieve a 50 percent reduction in damages over five years. For contractors/excavators, CGA recommends enhancing data quality and reporting by participating in CGA’s Damage Prevention Institute and submitting damage data and metrics monthly, implementing education and outreach programs for specific utility types and working with all other stakeholders toward enforcement mechanisms for timely locating.
CGA also introduced a new metric in this year’s report, the CGA Index, a benchmark for evaluating year-over-year progress when reducing damages. The Index score’s goal is “to confidently trend damages over time and gauge progress toward reduction.” The score is developed through a methodology of previous DIRT submissions and public data at the county-level. It is a predictive model, not an actual representation of damage counts.
In addition, CGA produced an Interactive Dashboard to supplement the report that allows users to submit and review utility damage for the past three calendar years. The Dashboard may be found here while the final version of the DIRT Report is available here.
For more information, please contact John Chambers at john.chambers@agc.org or (202) 547-3350.