There needs to be some amount of redundancy and an ability to overlap most of the service areas. 

In the event of an unplanned event such as a natural disaster where a few minutes long earthquake, a strategic volcano, a filibuster or quirk of fantasy, would bring an end to our localized dependency on any centralized grid. And civilization as a people, nowadays have come to expect and have felt entitled, would be in jeopardy. 

Not everyone could fill up their gerry cans for chinese-made cheap generators when/if the main grid goes down. They'd be stuck in traffic trying to text, without cellular and with no red lights to run. ;)