Mylar balloons are even worse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fclA3k2iHQk

Shocking! Who knew?!

(Certainly not the guy who crashed his car into a telephone pole, bringing it and the wires down. The still-hot (charged, they call it) wires went into a stream, and when the guy peed into said stream, he was electrocuted)

Longtime sloggers know that Grandfather Vel-DuRay was a lineman, and that I work for City Light. While I am often entertained and/or enchanted by the foibles of Our Local Utility, one thing I take very seriously is electricity itself. It can do some very creepy things.

or we can bury our powerlines like a civilized city...

Former Lurker, I'll tell you what: You launch an initiative to jack up taxes and tear up the city for the next sixty years, so that we can be a civilized city that has underground utilities (because it's not just electricity, you know). It would be an amazing jobs program!

And tell every homeowner that they'll have to pay around 10k each and tear up their yards so that they can hook up to this civilized new system.

Let us know how that works out for you.