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> The whole thing is insane. So they’ve basically created a system where we have no choice but to pay for the utilities failing infrastructure. LA doesn't seem to be failing, though. I mean, I get that regulation is unfair, and surely they're doing suboptimal things like every bureaucracy. Yet, the lights are on, the toilets are flushing and the ambulances are arriving. I don't see how demanding the third largest metropolis on the continent switch to a "hook it up or don't, your call" policy is going to do anything but make things much, much worse. Basically: your argument is predicated on the idea that you personally don't need to do these things because everyone else already did and you don't need the incremental advantages. But give everyone that choice, and no streets will be lit, no roads will be paved, and power and sewage will be plumbed only to neighborhoods that will collectively pay for it. That's the way it works in most of the developing world, and it sucks. No freeloading. If you want to live in the urban core of Los Angeles you need to be willing to live like your fellow Angelenos. |
Around here, PG&E wanted to charge us $10K to remove a poll and move an existing transformer to an existing poll (and would take years to "engineer" the solution and schedule the work, despite it being a few hours of work for one crew).
No idea what a residential transformer goes for, but I guarantee it's not a significant fraction of the $75K bill.
It is also insane that they are moving polls and not burying the lines.