I'm with scotzoidman on this one Osuche. Everything from the water company up to and including the meter is the water company's obligation to maintain/replace. And there are ways to run pipe with a lower degree of damage to landscaping and sidewalks. However, if your meter is right next to a sidewalk...well, odds are they'll have to tear up a section of it to replace the pipe. Either that or they can make a joint before and after the sidewalk and pray the pipe they leave underneath is ok. Has your water bill been unusually high lately? If so, that means the water is running through the meter so either the meter is bad or you have a leak somewhere in the house which I assume you would've discovered on your own.

What's the water company saying?

__________________
Though I am different from you,
We were born involved in one another.

For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul.

Complete surrender should not just come at moments in which one faces overwhelming odds, but in the calm when it seems one is personally in complete control of one's life.