I'm sure some of my dear and otherwise enterprising and beloved Kossack engineer friends here can explain why this is necessary, but down here in SE New Mexico, we are in a state of extreme drought, while simultaneously observing folks doing a lot of road work with the sewers, the drains. I haven't seen anything about the water mains yet, though I read the paper quite assiduously, but what do I know.
Today, the City, in all of its infinite wisdom, was mucking around and digging stuff up half a block away from here. After they more or less got done, they did this: