Professional excavation services for residential, commercial, and industrial projects. Foundation digs, trenching, mass excavation, and precision grading. Serving Homer and all of Cortland County.
Backwell provides professional excavation services in Homer, Cortland County, and the surrounding area. Excavation is our core competency. From precision foundation digs for custom homes to mass excavation for commercial and industrial facilities, Backwell brings the right iron for the right job. We self-haul all material with our own trucks and trailers, which means no waiting on third-party trucking and no schedule surprises. Every excavation project we take on is planned with proper bench cuts, dewatering considerations, and material management built in from the start.
Based in Constantia, NY, we are local to Cortland County and know the area, the soil conditions, the regulations, and the contractors. When you hire Backwell for your excavation project in Homer, you get a crew that shows up on time with the right equipment and gets the job done. Contact us today for a free estimate.
Homer sits in the Tioughnioga River valley just north of Cortland, on a broad outwash-floored valley cut into the Appalachian Plateau. The valley floor carries Howard gravelly loam and Chenango gravelly loam, well-drained, cobble-rich outwash, while the adjacent hillslopes run into Lordstown channery silt loam and Mardin channery silt loam with fragipan restrictions on deeper drainage.
The Tioughnioga River and Factory Brook define drainage on the valley floor, and the underlying Cortland-Homer-Preble sole-source aquifer imposes additional groundwater-protection requirements on commercial earthwork and stormwater design. Site work in Homer regularly involves cobble-heavy trenching in the outwash, aquifer-protective infiltration controls on pavement-heavy projects, and steep-slope and rock-excavation challenges when development climbs out of the valley onto the surrounding plateau. Frost depth on the valley floor is substantial, and utility burial depths typically reflect Cortland County climatic data rather than lake-moderated Syracuse norms. Projects close to the Tioughnioga River fall under NYSDEC stream-protection permitting in addition to Cortland County sole-source aquifer requirements, and structural fill is commonly imported where native outwash is too cobbly for slab support.
Commercial excavation projects in Central New York typically run $25,000 to $800,000 depending on scope, depth, volume, rock conditions, and site access. We provide fixed-price bids after a site walkthrough, no hourly guesswork.
Ground conditions across Central New York vary significantly, glacial till, sandy lake plains, heavier lacustrine clay, and shallow limestone bedrock are all common depending on location. We assess site-specific conditions before bidding and arrive staged for the conditions we expect rather than assuming a clean dig.
Backwell focuses on commercial and municipal excavation starting at $20,000, with most projects running $30,000 to $1 million or more. We work on commercial foundations, mass excavation, site development, and infrastructure, not small residential digs.
Yes. Our own fleet of tri-axle dump trucks handles all material hauling, no waiting on third-party trucking. We control the cycle time, coordinate disposal sites, and maintain manifests for any regulated material.
We keep rock-breaking attachments staged on every Central New York project. Shallow limestone bedrock and hardened glacial till are common here. When conditions require blasting, we coordinate the blasting permits and licensed contractor as part of the job.
Yes. We pull building department permits, NYSDOT right-of-way permits, SPDES/SWPPP documentation, and any county or state environmental permits required. We have standing relationships with engineering departments across Central New York and know the approval timelines in each jurisdiction.