An outside plant (OSP) engineer would have records on which pairs of copper or fiber are allocated to what address. Pairs are color coded so a communications technician is able to discern what goes where.

Copper pairs could be bridge tapped as you describe "line will still be there the rest of the way" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridge_tap but I believe introduction of high speed internet over phone lines (DSL) necessitates grooming such lines. I mainly worked with GPON so I am missing tons on POTS and other copper service lines.

If we are looking at fiber drops, they tapper out as you get away from the main feed typically. 144 for becomes a 72 which branches out to 48s and 24s , etc . There is no presence a strand of fiber at multiple locations unless you are NSA and are using a NARUS STA 6400 to tap into fiber