This Sydney water fountain is going viral for solving the exact problem 'Parks and Recreation' made famous
See how a small piece of metal is keeping the people safe from a legendary public habit.
A photo of a public water fountain in Sydney has the internet convinced that Australia solved one oddly specific problem years ago. After Reddit user (u/evango17) shared the image online on May 13, 2026, thousands of people immediately connected it to a famous running joke from "Parks and Recreation" that many fans still remember years later. The post has amassed over 38,000 upvotes in a matter of days.
Sydney has water fountains with a mouth guard so people don't put their lips directly on the spout
by u/evango17 in mildlyinteresting
Real-life solution to a fictional problem
It all started with the person posting the photo of a water fountain somewhere in Sydney with a mouth guard stopping people from touching their lips to the tap. Almost instantly, this struck a chord with the Reddit community. They couldn't help but draw a parallel between a real-life solution to a legendary fictional problem. For those who are unaware, this problem sprouts from the fictional town of Pawnee, Indiana, from "Parks and Recreation," where residents prefer to wrap their entire mouths around the public spouts like lollipops.
So, to solve this huge problem, during season 4's episode "Campaign Shake-Up", Ann Perkins decided to start an entire crusade to solve this issue. She introduced sanitary water fountains to the Parks Department. However, that quickly turned into chaos and a water fight, leaving her with no solution until April Ludgate came up with a spoutless water fountain design. The design completely got rid of the spout altogether, forcing the citizens of Pawnee to change their drinking habits.
The larger issue with public water fountains
Although that wasn't quite how Sydney dealt with this problem, it's hard to overlook the similarity here. Nonetheless, this further highlights the terrible situation of water fountains across the world, including Australia's neighboring country, New Zealand. A study held by students of the University of Otago brought to light the situation of public water fountains across Wellington. The students found that out of the 74 taps available across the city, only 47% of them had taps to fill up bottles. This number decreased to just 15% when talking about bowls for dogs.
At the same time, almost half of the taps had visible discolouration from algae or metal degradation, which indicates why Sydney's government might have decided to use these metal fittings. Although it seems like Sydney might've finally solved the issue that the sitcom made popular, only time will tell whether this will be a success or not. In the meantime, the people are having the time of their lives on Reddit, many of whom took to the comment section to make hilarious comments on these water spouts.
One of the best comments came from u/DarkPolumbo, who wondered about the city's planning for these spouts. "I imagine that Sydney had to go through similar trials of various designs that the residents kept defeating, so they could wrap their mouths around the spout uninhibited," the user wrote. Meanwhile, u/ZAlternates commented on their own nightmare experience with public fountains, "I vividly remember seeing a kid suck on the water fountain at school back in elementary school. I don’t remember who did it, but I can still picture it to this day," they noted.
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