Major Disapointment! Not Allowed in Construction Site!

[Cool Hand Fluke]

Yesterday I received a hot tip from one of my metal detecting buddies about a large area that goes back to the 1940's. It just recently had large areas of dirt moved around. I arrived today just after 5pm and tried to get permission to hunt. I talked to several of the supervisors and they would not let me metal detect the grounds! They said that they could not risk the liability! So I had to leave and just imagine what kind of silver coins I'll never get a chance to find.

So just look at the pics and wonder what might be there?!

 

[FCCDFEd]

Have had the same problems in my area, one guy said he was afraid I might dig up a main natural gas or electrical line. Pretty lame I thought especially when I showed him my gator digger. I wonder if it is a California thing or what.

 

[ok2raise]

I know in my area thier putting in a new industrail complex , it also a keep out or jail . they afraid someone might find some civil war or indian bones that would stop prodoction so that why most wont let you in during excavations

 

[maipenrai]

Hi Fluke, Are those pics from Sonoma valley? I was doing some security work at a building site, on the east side of the valley, no one coming to ask for permission to MD, but I can understand they might want to keep people out, thats just the mentality there. I spent my time at night, trying to bait a mountain lion, so I could get some pics, but unfortunately or fortunately, he never showed up on my shift!

If it had been the owner of the construction site, that you asked, he might have given permission, but since it was a supervisor, easier for him just to say no, than to have to explain to someone, what this guy with a detector is doing.
Its just the name of the game, I guess

 

[dirt doctor]

I lost out on two spots last year in the oldest part of a nearby city .The construction supervisors wouldn't let me in either of the spots . One is now a multi-level parking lot and the other is still cycloned off and with chest high weeds and now people throw their bags of garbage in there .The new parking lot would have had at least a few Barbers and Seateds. It's sickening .

 

[Sandman]

Yes it is sickening to be kept out of what you think is a hot spot. They are not worried about you finding any bones or relics but of you sueing them if you get hurt or stung by a bee. It is much easier to say NO than to have to worry about their job. Signing a release might help, but I doubt it. The land was there before they started construction, why didn't you hunt it then?

 

[dirt doctor]

Yes it is sickening to be kept out of what you think is a hot spot. They are not worried about you finding any bones or relics but of you sueing them if you get hurt or stung by a bee. It is much easier to say NO than to have to worry about their job. Signing a release might help, but I doubt it. The land was there before they started construction, why didn't you hunt it then?

Because the land had buildings on top of them these were demos .

 

[Cool Hand Fluke]

Yes it is sickening to be kept out of what you think is a hot spot. They are not worried about you finding any bones or relics but of you sueing them if you get hurt or stung by a bee. It is much easier to say NO than to have to worry about their job. Signing a release might help, but I doubt it. The land was there before they started construction, why didn't you hunt it then?

This is a well known area that is on private property. I've known about it since the early 1970's. What makes it special is the fact that all that dirt was moved around, the top layers that were probably saturated with clad and pulltabs was taken off by the dozer blades. This left the lower levels where the older silver coins would have been much more exposed. In my 25 years of metal detecting I've hunted dozens and dozens of places just like the example above, it has been feast or famine with the silver coins. Some of the areas I've hunted where large amounts of dirt has been removed has produced some of my better silver coins, while others have had only clads. So you never really know until you actually hunt it.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

From your description of them being "baseball fields", it sounds like it's a public site, right? Oh well, sometimes the foreman will add, with a wink "what I don't see after 5pm doesn't bother me" . Do you have a universal cat key? You can get them off ebay pretty easily.

I see you are from north of SF. Did you see the article about the park scrape in 2006, that occured in one of the old SF parks? We pulled hundreds of silvers out of that, during the course of their scraping off the turf to make way for astro-turf installation. The article was in Jan. 2008 W&E.

 

[deepskyal]

Could be they are more worried about theft than liability. Around here, if it isn't nailed down or guarded, it walks away. Seen a house being resided and someone came at night and stole the old aluminum siding...right off the house!
In my town, an old, rundown mill town, if the place is abandoned, there more than likely isn't any copper pipes left in it. I know of a few instances of heavy equipment being stolen from sites....one a store clerk thought the workers were just returning to the site...at night and drove off with the skidloader. It wasn't reported til the workers showed up at the site 2 days later. Long gone by then.

If there are No Trespassing signs posted, I suggest you heed the warning. If something disappears some night, you surely don't need the harassment that would follow. Chalk it up as a coulda, woulda been site.

Al

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Al, you are right: On top of the usual song & dance of "liability", a VERY BIG reason for fences around even the most mundane of const. sites nowadays, is: Const. equipment theft. Recycle value stuff, re-sell value stuff, etc... So a lot of times, those fences are probably not due they care less about the concept of metal detecting for coins, but rather, to keep out theft.

A buddy of mine was even spotted inside a fence (he had hopped over), by a const. worker. He thought "oh no, I'm gonna get booted". But on the contrary, the const. worker was quite intriqued at what my friend was finding, and asked him to keep an eye out for any suspicious activity. Ie.: my friend sort of became his "deputized security gaurd", and was welcome as sort of a "scare crow" from then on out, at that old-town demo. site.

Oh, and in regard to this particular (for this thread) site: Mike tells me this is a private site, not a public site. So ...... a different feel than if it had been a public school or park or whatever under-going renovation.

 

[Lowbatts]

I feel your pain. I just got my first ever booting from a contstruction site. A bridge that is going over a schoolyard from the 1920's. The schoolyard isn't the main attrraction though. It's the much older dance hall and clammer shacks and summer cottages that were located next to the river long ago.

I've been told to leave a site before by a weekend OT contractor once, wwent back during the weekday when the other guys were there and it was no problem. Also been told to leave a site that was fenced by a city engineer, told him to check with the site boss and it was okay.

But this time the contractor bigwigs were there with the public officials doing a walk through as the work was beginning and the contractor big shots told me no. Asking them if there was any problem if I hit it during the weekend got me a seemingly ambiguous "Our official answer to that would be no" and with that, it's a "No."

Because if someone else does not at least have my back unofficially, as in saying anything less than "No" then it's no go. I had just gotten a couple silvers and some relics and was waiting for some prime ground scrapes in the coming days/weeks.

Fortunately there's no end to building and rebuilding in this area so there's options. Better luck on your next site and remember, the dirt they scraped held numerous goodies and must have been taken somewhere to be dumped!

 

[Jason in Enid]

The worst part about these construction sites, is that the dirt they scrape off typically goes into the city trash landfill ! At least thats what the construction companies in my area do with it.

 

[Dwight S]

Go back to the site and attempt to discuss with the contractor, without the public officials there. When he said his "our official answer to that would be no", it gives the impression he was doing that for show. Being in the engineering/construction business for 20+ years, I've seen "official answers" and answers... If you go and discuss it and tell them that you'll leave the site in better shape than you found it in, it may make a difference. Offer to pick up the trash, whatever it takes. Discuss the construction process with them, you don't want to detect an area they've graded and prepared for paving, you'll ruin the work leaving a pothole when the dirt settles under the finish layer.

But also remember as others have said, it may be a liability issue as well. If something gets stolen, you'll proabaly be the one they look toward, unless you gain the trust of the contractor.