Who actually puts the paint on the ground
Virginia 811 and North Carolina 811 are notification centers. They take the ticket and pass it along. They do not own a line and they do not send anybody out to your lawn. Virginia builds that into the duty itself: under Code of Virginia section 56-265.17 A, one locate request counts as notice to every operator that belongs to the center. How far ahead that ticket goes in, how long it stays good and what happens on the day are a different question, and calling 811 before a pour covers it. This page is about what comes back painted and what never does.
The marking then sits on the operator. Section 56-265.19 A puts the marking itself on the operator or its contract locator, and has that same party post the result back through the center's positive response system. The gas company marks gas. The power company marks power. Some of them do it with their own people and some hire a locating firm, which is why two different trucks can show up on the same ticket.
One thing worth asking about on a rural place: the free marks reach lines belonging to operators who are members of the center. Membership is per operator, and our research did not open a member roster for any single county here, so we are not going to tell you that every small water system or co-op in Carroll or Grayson is on it. Virginia 811 publishes a member utility operators page and takes questions at its business office, 540-985-9355.
What a finished set of marks looks like
Virginia's State Corporation Commission rules give you something checkable on your own grass. Under 20VAC5-309-110, the distance between any two marks for the same line cannot exceed 20 feet, paint marks are "approximately eight to 10 inches in length and one to two inches in width" except where spot marking is needed, and at least three separate marks have to be made for each line. The same rule tells locators to switch to spot marking or another suitable method where line marking is considered damaging to property, and it names driveways and landscaping in that bracket. The rule does not say who makes that call on a particular drive, so ask the locator on the day.
North Carolina adds a detail of its own. Under G.S. 87-121(a)(1a), the operator's identity has to be marked at the beginning point, at intervals of 200 linear feet, and at the end point of the proposed dig. If you are on the North Carolina side and there is a long painted run across the yard with nothing naming who it belongs to, that is a fair thing to ask about before anybody digs.
Why there is no color chart on this page
Both states hand the color question to the same outside body and neither one prints the answer. Virginia's section 56-265.21 runs to one sentence, and the operative end of it reads "the American Public Works Association color codes shall be used." North Carolina's G.S. 87-121(a)(1) says the operator shall "use the APWA Uniform Color Code." So the colors on your lawn come from a document published by a trade association, not from either statute.
When this was researched, the association's own posted copy of that code would not open at the source. We are not going to reprint a color table we could not read at the place it comes from, and we are certainly not going to attribute one to a code section that does not contain it. That is exactly how a wrong number ends up on a live page and then on somebody's lawn.
If there is paint out there and you want to know what it is, the fastest honest route is to ask. Call the notification center that took the ticket, or ask the locator while they are still standing in the yard. Whoever made the mark knows what it is and it costs nothing to ask.
Where the free marks stop
The dividing line is the point of consumption. Virginia 811's own page puts it at the water meter for water and at the cleanout for sewer, and where that point sits for any other line on your lot is a question for the operator or a locating contractor. Up to that point the line belongs to an operator. Past it, the line belongs to you.
Virginia writes that into its definitions. At section 56-265.15 A, a water system "does not include private water laterals," and a sewer system "includes sewer system laterals but does not include private sewer laterals." Section 56-265.19:1 E finishes the thought: a water system operator "shall not be responsible for marking private water laterals." Virginia 811 says the same thing in plain words on its homeowners page, that the line connecting your house to the meter is private and will not be marked when you contact Virginia 811.
This is not a gap somebody forgot to close. It is how the free service is drawn, in both states, and it is the single most useful thing to understand before a slab goes over your yard.
The lines nobody is coming to mark
Virginia 811 publishes its own list of private utilities that will not be marked: lines running from your home to a detached garage or shed, invisible pet fences, lines related to satellite or dish television, septic tanks and the lines associated with them, and propane tanks and the lines associated with them. Read that list against a country lot and you have described most of what is actually buried between the house and the new pour.
A private well works the same way by the same logic. There is no operator and there is no meter, so the feed out to the pump is yours for its whole length and nothing on a free ticket goes looking for it. The same is true of a wire run out to a shop, a barn or a pole light you or somebody before you put in.
North Carolina writes more of this straight into the statute. G.S. 87-117(12) says swimming pools and irrigation systems, petroleum storage systems, septic tanks and liquefied petroleum gas systems are not underground facilities for the purposes of the act, so long as nothing encroaches on an operator's easement, right-of-way or permitted use, and unless the gas system falls under the federal pipeline rules. North Carolina 811 states the duty in its homeowner brochure: "It is the responsibility of the caller to contact a utility locating company to have any private lines located."
What a private locate costs, we will not guess at. Neither statute sets a price, and neither 811 center puts out a figure of its own, so any number on this page would be invented. Call a locating contractor for a quote. On a place with a well, a drainfield and a propane tank, that is money spent on the three lines that tend to be in the way, and it is worth knowing where the drainfield sits for other reasons too, which is a separate question about weight on a septic field.
Two kinds of line that stay unmarked even though they are not yours
Storm water is the first one. Under G.S. 87-121(j), gravity fed sanitary sewers installed before that article took effect, and all storm water facilities, are exempt from the location requirements. The statute then adds a shield, and it is worth reading the way it is actually written: neither the excavator nor the person financially responsible for the excavation is liable for damage to an unmarked line of that kind if the excavator exercises due care to protect existing facilities when there is evidence of those facilities near the proposed excavation area. The exemption is from marking. The protection from liability is separate, and care is its condition. The date that article took effect was not confirmed in our research, so do not assume a year for the old sewer half of it. North Carolina 811 can tell you.
Virginia has its own cutoff and it is written into the definition rather than into an exemption. At section 56-265.15 A, the term utility line "does not include any gravity sewer system or any combination gravity storm/sanitary sewer system within any counties, cities, towns or political subdivisions constructed or replaced prior to January 1, 1995."
There is one courtesy in the Virginia rules that is easy to mistake for a locate. Under 20VAC5-309-110 G, if a locator marking a line runs into a customer-owned line of the same type, the operator "shall make a reasonable effort to contact the excavator or the customer to advise of the presence of the line." That is a reasonable effort to tell you it is there. It is not a duty to go find it, and it is not something to plan a dig around. If any of this turns into a question about who issues what on your side of the line, start with our Virginia concrete permits guide or, if you are south of the state line, how we work across into North Carolina.