What Lebanon’s grading permit form asks
Lebanon’s Engineering Department, on Castle Heights Avenue North, issues the city’s land disturbance permit. Its form sets the order of things:
- A site over one acre needs a state Notice of Intent and an NPDES number before the city grading permit.
- Springs, wetlands and blue-line streams on the site flag a state Aquatic Resource Alteration Permit (ARAP) review.
- The city wants 10 working days’ notice before construction starts.
- Once the permit is issued, work has to begin within 180 days.
Two clocks on every Lebanon permit
Ten working days is two calendar weeks, and it sets the earliest start once the permit is in hand. The 180-day window runs the other way: a permit issued long before the crew is ready can lapse. Both dates belong on the schedule before clearing is booked.
Sinkholes are a state question first
The form is plain about karst. If a project will directly impact a sinkhole or a cave, the state requires a Class V injection well permit. Filling a sinkhole to level a yard, or running a new drain line into one, is the kind of change that permit is about, and it comes before the dirt work.
So when we walk a Lebanon lot, we look for depressions, open holes and springs before we talk about grade.
Cedar glades and thin soil
Locals call Lebanon “Cedar City.” The Cedars of Lebanon state natural area covers 2,690 acres of Wilson County and is the largest contiguous cedar glade-barrens complex in public ownership. The state ties those glades to limestone outcrops and shallow soils.
Shallow soil over rock changes excavation. Footings, trenches and drain lines can reach limestone quickly, and the plan for breaking it or working around it belongs in the estimate. Lebanon had 38,431 people in 2020, with I-40 south of the city and US 70, 70N and 231 running through it.