Confidence: verified (standard US AEC/utility practice) · Last verified: 2026-07-03 · Original SYMATEQ content.
It's tempting to picture permitting as a single step that happens after construction documents are finished — submit the set, wait, get a permit. In practice, permitting and utility coordination are processes that need to start well before CDs are complete, because both AHJ plan review and utility service applications can take long enough to become the actual schedule-critical path on a project, independent of how quickly the design itself is finished.
Plan review: a second, independent check by people who didn't design the building
Once a CD set is submitted, the AHJ's plan review staff (which may include separate reviewers for building, electrical, mechanical, and plumbing/fire scope, depending on the jurisdiction's structure) check the drawings against the adopted code editions and local amendments — the same code editions this hub's state-by-state adoption data tracks (see ../data/reference/national-code-adoption-overview.md). Review comments typically come back as corrections requiring a response — a revised drawing, a clarifying note, or a documented justification — and the project cycles through resubmittal until the reviewer is satisfied. Because this cycle can go through multiple rounds, and because different jurisdictions have very different review timelines (some measured in days, others in months), the state-by-state adoption/AHJ data in this hub is directly relevant to realistic schedule planning, not just to code-compliance accuracy.
Deferred submittals: intentionally incomplete permit sets, by design
Some scope is deliberately deferred from the initial permit submission — fire sprinkler layout is the most common example, but specific MEP equipment (a specific manufacturer's rooftop unit curb/structural details, a specific fire alarm device layout) is often deferred as well, when the specific product selection depends on a later bid/procurement decision (see 03-bidding-procurement-and-value-engineering.md). A deferred submittal isn't a permit violation — it's a formally tracked, AHJ-acknowledged commitment to submit that specific scope later, before that portion of work is installed — but it has to be explicitly identified and accepted by the AHJ as deferred at the time of initial permit, not discovered as a gap during a later inspection.
Utility coordination: applications that need to start early because utilities run on their own schedule, not the project's
Getting new electrical service, gas service, and water/sewer taps connected requires separate applications to each utility, filed early enough that the utility's own design, material-procurement, and construction schedule (which the project has essentially no control over) doesn't become the limiting factor for the building's completion date. Utility coordination typically involves: an application identifying the service size/capacity needed (which is exactly why an accurate, not just conservative, load calculation matters early — see ../nec-explained/article-220-load-calculations.md for the electrical service-sizing logic feeding this application); a review and design step by the utility itself (routing, transformer sizing, meter location); and physical connection work that has to be coordinated with the site's own civil/utility trenching. On many projects, especially ones needing a new or upsized electrical service, the utility's own timeline — not the AHJ's plan review, and not the contractor's construction schedule — turns out to be the actual critical path.
Why the color-coded utility marking convention matters at this stage, not just during excavation
Once utility routing is planned, utility locations get marked in the field using a standardized color code (the APWA convention — red for electric, yellow for gas/oil, blue for water, green for sewer, orange for communications) before any excavation begins, so that different utility trades and the general excavation crew all recognize what they're working around. This marking step is a site-safety and utility-protection function that sits at the boundary between the design/permitting process covered here and actual physical construction — a design team that hands off utility routing drawings without confirming this marking step is scheduled is leaving a real coordination gap for the construction phase to inherit.
Why this phase deserves early attention even though it produces no drawings of its own
Neither plan review timelines nor utility service timelines are activities the design team directly controls once initiated — they're processes run by third parties (the AHJ, the utility) with their own queues, staffing, and review cycles. The practical lesson is that permitting and utility applications should be initiated as early as the design has adequate information to support them, generally well before the full CD set is 100% complete in every discipline, rather than treated as a purely sequential step that waits for full design completion — a project that treats permitting and utility coordination as strictly sequential-after-design is very often the project that ends up schedule-delayed by exactly those two processes.
Source / verify: Standard US AHJ plan review practice (varies significantly by jurisdiction — confirm specific review timeline and process against the local building department), standard utility new-service application practice (varies by utility provider), APWA uniform color code for temporary marking of underground utilities. Confirm the specific AHJ's review structure and the specific utility's application requirements for the project's actual jurisdiction.