Land clearing & earthwork in Melbourne
South Brevard has more overgrown vacant lots than anywhere else we work. Tens of thousands of parcels platted in the nineteen-sixties and never built on. Mulching from $1,200 an acre, clearing from $1,500, and a number back the same day in almost every case.
to start
in Titusville
to schedule
turnaround
Coast, canal country, and everything between
Melbourne and the country immediately around it covers three quite different working conditions within about ten miles.
East, toward the lagoon. Older, built-out Melbourne along the Indian River, Crane Creek and the Eau Gallie side. Small established lots, mature oak and a lot of work that’s really access and drainage rather than clearing. Drives, pads, and getting water away from houses that were built before anyone thought hard about it.
The platted-lot belt. This is what makes south Brevard different from anywhere else in the service area. From 1959 onward, General Development Corporation laid out an enormous residential subdivision across what’s now Palm Bay, and a great many of those quarter- and half-acre lots were sold and never built on. Sixty-odd years later they’re grown over with palmetto, Brazilian pepper, volunteer oak and pine. With a paved road and a lot number out front. They’re close to the perfect mulching job: known boundaries, road access, and a single machine on and off in a day.
If you have just bought one of these lots and want to see what you own, that’s a mulching or brush-cutting job rather than clearing, and it’s the cheapest possible way to find out whether the parcel is what you thought it was.
West of I-95. The ground out here was marsh before the Melbourne-Tillman district cut roughly 180 miles of canal through it starting in the 1920s, draining some forty thousand acres. It works and it has worked for a century, but it means the land sits inside a managed drainage grid: your fall has to reach a ditch, the ditches have to stay open, and a parcel that floods usually has a blocked route rather than a hopeless elevation. It also means wet-season judgment matters more here than on the coast.
Areas we cover
- Melbourne, Eau Gallie and the riverfront
- West Melbourne and Melbourne Village
- Palm Bay and the Port Malabar lots
- Malabar, Grant and Valkaria
- Viera and Suntree to the north
Most common jobs here
- Vacant platted lots mulched to see the ground
- Lots cleared for a single-family build
- Drives cut in on lots with no access yet
- Drainage corrected on older coastal lots
What to expect where
Rough guide by where the parcel sits. Send photos and we’ll tell you which one you have.
| Where | Typical parcel | What the work usually is | Season |
|---|---|---|---|
| Riverfront and Eau GallieOlder established lots | Built-out, mature trees, small footprints. | Drainage correction, drives, pads. Rarely clearing. | any month |
| The platted-lot beltQuarter to half acre, unbuilt | Sixty years of growth on a surveyed lot with road frontage. | One-day mulching, or clearing if a build is going on it. | any month |
| West of I-95Larger parcels, canal drained | Former marsh inside a managed drainage grid. | Clearing and grading, with the ditch route as the first question. | Nov–Apr |
| Malabar and ValkariaRural acreage | Flatwoods and scrub, larger lots, longer access. | Acreage mulching and clearing, drives cut in from the road. | Nov–Apr |
Work like yours
A lot of south Brevard work is lots that were platted and then left alone.
What we do in Melbourne
Ground work
Access & structure
Melbourne questions
I bought a vacant lot and can’t see the corners. What do I need?
Almost always mulching rather than clearing. One machine takes the growth down in a day, you can walk the parcel and see the shape of it, and a survey crew can work it afterwards without fighting palmetto. Clearing. Roots out and bare soil is what you buy later, when you actually build.
Why are there so many empty lots out here?
They were platted from 1959 onward as part of an enormous subdivision laid out across what’s now Palm Bay, sold nationally, and in many cases never built on. The roads went in, the lots were surveyed, and sixty years of growth happened on top. It’s why south Brevard has more one-day mulching jobs than anywhere else we work.
My lot floods west of I-95. Can you fix it?
Often, and the first question is where the water is supposed to go. That ground sits inside a drainage grid of canals and ditches cut from the 1920s onward. When a parcel out there floods it’s usually because its route to a ditch is blocked or was never shaped, which is a grading job. What we’ll not do is tie into anything public. That’s a different trade.
Do you charge travel to Melbourne?
Not normally. It’s about an hour from the yard, which is a standard working distance for us. As everywhere, a very small job a long way out can carry a minimum, and we tell you that up front rather than inflating the acre rate.
Can you do several lots at once?
Yes, and it’s much cheaper per lot. Getting the truck, trailer and machine down here costs the same whether we do one parcel or four, so investors and builders combining lots into a single trip see a real saving. Tell us all the parcel numbers when you ask.