Excavation and land clearing across Cumberland County, NC.

The Cape Fear River runs through Cumberland County from northwest to southeast, passing through Fayetteville on its way toward Bladen and eventually the coast. Most of the populated land in the county sits on either side of the river, with Fayetteville on the south bank and the suburban municipalities (Hope Mills to the southwest, Spring Lake and Fort Liberty land to the northwest, Eastover to the east) spread around the metro core. The terrain transitions from inland coastal plain in the eastern half of the county to the edge of the Sandhills along the western boundary — but unlike Scotland or Hoke, only the very western strip of Cumberland is true Sandhills, and most jobs we get called for are on the coastal-plain side.

Fort Liberty’s footprint covers tens of thousands of acres in the northwest part of the county and into Hoke. We do not work on the federal land — that work goes through federal contracting channels, not through us — but the surrounding civilian areas are where the practical work happens. Spring Lake sits right outside the gate. Fayetteville itself grew up as a market town that became a military town, and the housing, retail, and infrastructure around the base have shaped the county’s residential and commercial development patterns for decades. Hope Mills, on the south side of the metro, is one of the fastest-growing parts of the county and the place where the most new residential excavation work tends to come from.

The Cape Fear River floodplain runs through the middle of the county and the river itself has had several significant flood events in living memory, including major flooding from Hurricane Matthew in 2016 and Hurricane Florence in 2018. Property close to the river or to Cross Creek (the tributary that runs through downtown Fayetteville) has drainage and base-prep considerations that property further from the water does not. The soil mix is also varied — sandier in the western Sandhills strip, more clay-influenced in the eastern lowlands — and getting the base prep right depends on knowing which part of the county the site sits in.

A practical reality of Cumberland County work is that the civilian contractor and trades ecosystem is one of the largest and most competitive in the eastern part of the state. There are a lot of excavation contractors working out of Fayetteville, most of them larger and closer to the metro than we are. We are not trying to compete head-on with the Fayetteville-based crews on every job. What we do is take Cumberland County work that is on a route we are already running — typically jobs in the Hope Mills, Eastover, or eastern Fayetteville area that pair with work in neighboring Bladen or Sampson — and quote the work honestly against what local crews would charge. If the local guys can do it cheaper because they are five miles from the site instead of an hour, we will tell you that during the site visit.