I’m not sure it directly helps anyone’s argument here, but 5 minute’s searching gave this study of water service in Nigeria, with a mixture of public and privat

I’m not sure it directly helps anyone’s argument here, but 5 minute’s searching gave this study of water service in Nigeria, with a mixture of public and private services competing to provide potable water using different strategies. http://file.scirp.org/pdf/JWARP20120700002_74310948.pdf http://file.scirp.org/pdf/JWARP20120700002_74310948.pdf I think two responses to this would be a) that sounds like terrible public and private provision, and b) the competing water providers don’t all use pipes — they use boreholes, tankers, and rainwater collection, so they don’t count. But that’s probably how competition against an apparent natural monopoly would work: what might undermine Comcast, say, isn’t another cable company digging up the road, but a wireless broadband provider, or some technological alternative that circumvent the apparent advantages of the monopolist.