I know what Miss Utility is but for the life of me I can’t figure out why they feel the need to spray paint things like sidewalks, trees, or asphalt driveways. Only one of these things happened to me, which is why I don’t think this fits into the BBQ Pit forum, or why I won’t call them to read them the riot act. I assume each neighbor makes their own calls. But here is what they’ve done in our neighborhood over the last couple years:
Painted four red dots arranged in a half circle on our asphalt driveway. Cute, but… WTF? If the cable really tucks under the driveway and back out again two feet away, do you really need to paint the asphalt?
Painted a straight line across a neighbor’s concrete driveway, about 2 feet long. Didn’t they used to just spray the grass on either side, and the laborers could extrapolate the cable run from that?
A second neighbor got his tree painted. There’s a 1-foot line straight up the trunk of the tree (with a dashed line on the grass leading up to it). Now, if they’re running cables up the center of tree trunks now, I’d like to know what the technical advantage of doing that is.
Any of you have issues with Miss-use of utility marking?
If they dug and hit a power line, you’d be shocked.
If they dug and hit a gas line, it might blow your mind.
And if they dug and hit your internet and cable line?
The paint doesn’t last that long. The next time your water, power, cable, internet, or phone goes out it may very well be due to someone who dug without calling Miss Utility. It’s a good idea.
I think you guys missed my point. I’m not complaining about Miss Utility doing their job. I’m complaining about them painting stuff that they shouldn’t. Instead of painting a driveway, why not paint a line on the grass on either side of it. A sensible person can see the two lines and understand that the cable probably runs under the driveway. And there’s no excuse whatsoever for painting up the trunk of a tree. That was pure assholery.
Possibly the previous complaint was about someone who didn’t want their lawn painted and asked why the driveway and tree weren’t painted instead. I can see a couple of my neighbors caring more about their grass than their driveway and trees.
“the cable probably runs under the driveway” doesn’t cut it when messing with utility lines, especially gas and electric. They need to be 100% specific to leave no chance of misunderstanding.
I’m in complete agreement with JcWoman. I live adjacent to an undeveloped street with two large natural gas lines beneath it. Pacific Gas & Electric seems to need to mark where the gas line runs on a regular basis. My driveway is commonly marked with white paint and the paved street gets blue lines for water and yellow lines for an underground electrical anode. Then add those little colored flags on wire stuck into the ground where paint won’t be visible.
To be fair, PG&E does usually dig something up. But only a long stretch of winter rain will erase the paint and I have to go around and collect the flags when the work seems to be over. (I have a good bundle of multicolored flags.)
