Who installs your driveway culvert in Hardin County depends on whose road it is

Cutting a driveway into a rural lot here starts with a culvert, the pipe that lets the roadside ditch keep draining under your entrance. In Hardin County that's not a do-it-yourself afternoon: the county installs all roadside culverts on county-maintained roads itself, for a $50 permit, and you furnish the pipe cut to its specifications.

The road matters, though. The county won't touch culverts on state highways or private roads. If your frontage is on a US or state route, say a stretch of US 69/96/287 or a state-numbered highway, that's TxDOT's call, and you'd phone their Beaumont-area office at (409) 246-2300. On a true private road, it's on the road's owners, not the county.

So before you buy materials, figure out exactly what your frontage is. A quick look at whether the road carries a county-road number versus a state-highway shield tells you which office to call, and saves you from ordering pipe for a job the county won't do.