Professional excavation services for residential, commercial, and industrial projects. Foundation digs, trenching, mass excavation, and precision grading. Serving Syracuse and all of Onondaga County.
Backwell provides professional excavation services in Solvay, Onondaga 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 Onondaga County and know the area, the soil conditions, the regulations, and the contractors. When you hire Backwell for your excavation project in Solvay, 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.
Solvay occupies the west shore of Onondaga Lake in Onondaga County, on a landscape dominated by the legacy of the Solvay Process Company's soda ash wastebeds. Native soils across the village are predominantly Palmyra gravelly loam on the higher outwash benches and Lamson and Minoa fine sandy loams on the lowland flats, but historic industrial fill — including the characteristic white Solvay wastebed material — overlies a substantial fraction of the commercially zoned land.
Onondaga Creek and Ninemile Creek both discharge near the village, and the Onondaga Lake AOC cleanup program controls earthwork, dewatering, and soil-disposal permitting on a significant portion of the buildable land. Commercial site work in Solvay consistently involves subsurface characterization to define the extent of Solvay waste and historic industrial fill, engineered containment and soil-management plans, and stormwater design that ties into the Onondaga Lake watershed framework. Bedrock is deep. Groundwater chemistry issues are a recurring factor in utility and foundation design. Projects along Milton Avenue and the lakefront almost always require remediation-grade soil management plans and close coordination with the Onondaga Lake AOC program.
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.