Utility as-built drawings record where pipes were designed, not installed

After underground utilities are installed, the contractor is supposed to create 'as-built' drawings documenting the actual location, depth, and alignment of what was put in the ground. In practice, the as-built is almost always just the original design drawing with a stamp on it. The contractor doesn't re-survey the pipe's actual position — they return the design plan and call it done. The difference between designed position and actual position can be several feet horizontally and 12+ inches vertically, because field conditions (rock, existing utilities, roots) force the installer to deviate. These inaccurate as-builts then get digitized into the utility's GIS system, where they become the 'official' record used by 811 locators and future project designers. According to the CGA 2022 DIRT Report, inaccurate as-builts were the root cause of 3,558 underground utility strikes in a single year. The problem persists because there is no enforcement mechanism: no inspector verifies that as-builts match what was actually installed, no GPS survey of final pipe position is required, and the cost of doing a proper as-built survey ($2,000-5,000 per project) is seen as waste by contractors who are already on to the next job. So every year, more fiction gets added to the underground map.