Land clearing around Bacchus Marsh and on the rural edge of Melton is not a suburban site cut with a longer driveway. The machine has to reach the work, the material has to have somewhere legal to go, and anything that must stay — a house, a tree under a permit, a neighbour’s fence — has to be obvious before the first pass.
Clearing means a stated area, not the whole title
Rural titles are large and the building area is not. “Clear the block” on a few acres can mean the house pad, a driveway, a tank pad and a firebreak, or it can mean someone imagined the whole title scraped. Those are different days and different spoil volumes. Draw the area, even if the drawing is a muddy aerial with a line on it.
We work from Melton. Bacchus Marsh and the rural fringe are a reasonable run when the job is real, and a poor run when the instruction is vague and the track is wet. Say which gate we use and whether a truck-and-trailer or only a rigid tipper will fit. If the last kilometre is a farm track, say what it does after rain.
Slopes toward Sunbury and Diggers Rest have their own notes in the sloping block guide. A Bacchus Marsh rise can be the same problem: the cut wants to become a fill on the low side, and the low side may be a drainage line you are not allowed to block.
The track is part of the job
A cleared pad you cannot reach with a truck is a stockpile with a view. If spoil has to leave, the track has to carry the truck you have allowed in the quote. If it will not, we either improve the track as a line item or we change the method, which is slower.
Wet clay on these roads ruts fast. A price that assumes a dry week in August is a price that will be rearranged. Build a weather day into anything west of Melbourne that is not on a sealed estate road. We would rather move the booking than cut a pad and then spend the afternoon towing a tipper.
Gates, cattle grids, low branches and a power feed to a shed all sit on the route. Photos taken from the cab height, not from a drone only, show what the truck driver will actually meet. Send both if you have them.
What stays, what goes, what is a house
Trees that stay need a mark. Trees that go need a decision about the stump and the root ball, especially if a slab or a wastewater field will sit there later. A stump ground flush with today’s surface is still a stump after you cut 500 mm off the pad.
Scattered brick, an old shed, fencing wire and a collapsed water tank are the usual “while you’re here” pile. We can load them if the quote includes them and the facility will take them. Wire and steel mixed through soil is a bad surprise in a “clean fill” load. Pile it separately if you can, or tell us it is mixed so we do not price it as soil.
A house, even a derelict one, is not a heap of timber. If there's an old house or shed on the block, it needs to be demolished and cleared before the site cut. Clearing around a house that is staying is a different, smaller job: we work to a line and we do not undermine footings you meant to keep.
Spoil still has to go somewhere legal
Acreage tempts people to push material into a dam, a gully or the neighbour’s side of the fence. That is not a method we will quote. Spoil we cart goes to a facility that accepts it. Spoil we keep on site stays where you are allowed to place it, shaped so it does not become a dam on a fence line.
If the history of the block includes a tip, a spray shed, or fill of unknown origin, say so. We will not blend that into a building pad and call it a cut to level. Identification comes before the truck. Spoil and waste are taken to licensed recycling and disposal facilities in Melbourne's west, with clean fill, rock and concrete separated for reuse wherever possible.
Our truck work and soil removal pages describe load counts on ordinary jobs. A rural haul is longer, so the same cubic metres cost more time. The quote should show that, not hide it inside a day rate that assumed a Melton estate.
Clearing is not the slab level
Once the area is open, the building pad is still a site cut to someone’s levels. Clearing gets the machine to the dirt. The cut gets the dirt to the drawing. Booking only the first and expecting the second is how the house set-out lands on a surface that is “about right” and then is not.
Send the address, the area you want open, what must stay, and whether a structure has to come down before we start. Call 0414 011 405 or use the quote form. If you are comparing us with a crew based further away, compare the haul and the track, not just the machine size on the rate card.
We do not keep a depot in Bacchus Marsh. The work is run from Melton when the job fits the diary. If the track or the scope does not fit, we will say so before you have a date that we cannot keep.
FAQ
Do you clear acreage as well as house lots?
We clear and cut blocks we can reach with our machines and trucks from the Melton base, including rural edges toward Bacchus Marsh when the track and the haul make sense. We do not take on a job we cannot get a truck to.
Can cleared timber and soil stay on the block?
Only where you are allowed to keep it and it is not in the way of the building pad or a drainage line. Burning, mulching and carting are different outcomes. Say which one you want. We will not assume a pile in the back paddock is acceptable.
Is an old house part of the clearing?
If there's an old house or shed on the block, it needs to be demolished and cleared before the site cut. Pushing a shed over and loading the debris can be earthworks if the quote says so. Do not mix the two under the word clearing.
What about a septic on a rural block?
Treat it as its own line. Pump-out is not our job. The dig and the cartage are, once the destination of the load is confirmed. See the Melton tank note for how we separate those steps.