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“Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

arstechnica.com

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Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#41

Post by hackuser »

korethr wrote: post #36
hackuser wrote: post #20

It might work out fine, but we need to hear from the people who would carry the actual the burden under this proposal, such as those in the construction industry that will have to lay the conduit under 'Dig once', and those who currently make money from laying cable who will have their business taken away. We also need to hear from experts in that field about how much it will cost and how it is best done. As written…

I don't think those who presently are contracted for the cable laying work will have their work taken away from them. If anything, I think this is likely to guarantee work for some time. Say a road construction company wins the bid and gets a contract to work on a section of federally-funded road. I think it is likely they would already have some of the work, equipment or supplies sub-contracted out to specialists. D…

That sounds reasonable, but my point is that we all (or most of us, myself included) are ignorant and speculating, and so are the reporter, the article, and possibly everyone quoted in it.

You wouldn't believe a story about the costs, feasibility, impact, etc. of an IT project if the reporter only talked to people in the construction industry and not to any IT professionals.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#42

Post by rayiner »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #37
massysett wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"outside of last mile usage, which this bill is directed at" How is that? It applies only to federally funded projects. Most homes and businesses are not on federally funded roads. This bill is not a FTTH driver.

FTTH is a type of last mile, FTTH is not the only consumer of last mile fiber. The future of America is not, and never will be, FTTH. The future of America is FTTF/FTTDP (fiber to the frontage/distribution point) to a street/basement cabinet that houses current generation micro-headends and micro-DSLAMs that are setup to handle the last 500-1000 feet, speaking G.fast and DOCIS 3.x as very small greenfield installatio…

> There is literally no reason why, today, we don't have at least 50/10 to every goddamned home in America. Every goddamned home, no matter how far you are out in the sticks.

Because the country is huge, and building adequate backhaul to sparsely populated areas is very expensive.

> This is a drain on our economy every second we aren't working towards this actually rather easy to achieve goal.

I find this sort of argument to beg the question. How much would it really increase overall GDP to get at least 25/3 (the current FCC standard) to the 10% of the country that lacks it? Especially considering that everyone can get satellite broadband, which covers the core things people need internet for: job applications, access to online educational resources, electronic payment processing, etc.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#43

Post by jessaustin »

ec109685 wrote: post #23
mi100hael wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would only apply to projects receiving federal funding, which I don't imagine includes most subdivisions. Most likely just interstates, state highways, and maybe county highways. That wouldn't necessarily get fiber through your front door, but it should get it far enough out to provide a viable high speed option for rural households that are currently stuck with dial up or satellite.

They can make taking federal highway funds contingent on adopting a dig once policy for locally funded projects. This is how the speed limit and drinking age was standardized across the country.

It will be an interesting change, for the federal government to use this power for good rather than evil.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#44

Post by Retric »

rayiner wrote: post #42
DiabloD3 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FTTH is a type of last mile, FTTH is not the only consumer of last mile fiber. The future of America is not, and never will be, FTTH. The future of America is FTTF/FTTDP (fiber to the frontage/distribution point) to a street/basement cabinet that houses current generation micro-headends and micro-DSLAMs that are setup to handle the last 500-1000 feet, speaking G.fast and DOCIS 3.x as very small greenfield installatio…

> There is literally no reason why, today, we don't have at least 50/10 to every goddamned home in America. Every goddamned home, no matter how far you are out in the sticks. Because the country is huge, and building adequate backhaul to sparsely populated areas is very expensive. > This is a drain on our economy every second we aren't working towards this actually rather easy to achieve goal. I find this sort of arg…

We are talking about less than 1/1,000th of our current GDP so no, it's not a question of having a larger GDP. GDP is simply not the problem, it's local monopolies that keep getting funded to fix a problem have no incentive to actually fix the problem.

Remember, we rolled out copper wire to every home with a far smaller GDP, doing the same for fiber is relatively speaking a smaller investment.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#45

Post by iamatworknow »

PaulHoule wrote: post #34
rayiner wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea is to get fiber into the last mile. Vast parts of the country are still under construction. New subdivisions are being built, and people are moving there from established northeastern/midwestern states. Requiring conduit to be put underground as you build the roads for a new subdivision, for example, would dramatically reduce the costs to deploy fiber in these places.

Roads regularly get resurfaced in places that are already well-established, so it's not just a "new construction" thing.

Resurfacing, especially in rural areas, is exactly that -- the existing road is scored and then paved over. There's not enough room there to insert a conduit without actually digging a channel.

I'm not saying that work shouldn't be done, but it wouldn't be a case of just throwing down a pipe during normal resurfacing work.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#46

Post by qaq »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #4
rayiner wrote: post #2

This is a great bill. It creates a slight public subsidy for broadband, but the total amount of subsidy is minimized by tying it to digging that's already going to be done. This should be extended to power line and water pipe construction. No reason you can't put in some dark fiber while you've got someone up there hanging new power line (which I imagine is way more expensive). Most importantly, it minimizes market d…

More importantly: we already did this. Remember when they overhauled the highway system in a lot of areas back in the late 80s and through the 90s? While they were digging, they dropped a lot of fiber. Almost all of the major routes we use today for teleco/internet routing were laid or substantially upgraded then. Almost all the dark fiber laid was laid then. The hilarious part? Most of the fiber laid could do at lea…

Companies have being running various WDM solutions on backbone links for ages.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#47

Post by rayiner »

Retric wrote: post #44
rayiner wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is literally no reason why, today, we don't have at least 50/10 to every goddamned home in America. Every goddamned home, no matter how far you are out in the sticks. Because the country is huge, and building adequate backhaul to sparsely populated areas is very expensive. > This is a drain on our economy every second we aren't working towards this actually rather easy to achieve goal. I find this sort of arg…

We are talking about less than 1/1,000th of our current GDP so no, it's not a question of having a larger GDP. GDP is simply not the problem, it's local monopolies that keep getting funded to fix a problem have no incentive to actually fix the problem. Remember, we rolled out copper wire to every home with a far smaller GDP, doing the same for fiber is relatively speaking a smaller investment.

I'm asking about the economic benefits to GDP of rolling out broadband to the places that don't yet have it, considering that they can get satellite.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#48

Post by pc2g4d »

jmcdiesel wrote: post #29
eldavido wrote: post #19

Isn't all the trouble we have due to last-mile shenanigans? Until we can address that problem, this seems a bit moot. Perhaps what we need is something like this, but at the state/local level.

Thats why sidewalks are included... having conduit with all new sidewalks would definitely ease the last mile

Does the federal government build many sidewalks?

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#49

Post by jessaustin »

jmcdiesel wrote: post #29
eldavido wrote: post #19

Isn't all the trouble we have due to last-mile shenanigans? Until we can address that problem, this seems a bit moot. Perhaps what we need is something like this, but at the state/local level.

Thats why sidewalks are included... having conduit with all new sidewalks would definitely ease the last mile

It always amazes and dismays me, how much construction goes on in which developers are not required to build sidewalks.

Re: “Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US

#50

Post by stevehawk »

jmcdiesel wrote: post #29
eldavido wrote: post #19

Isn't all the trouble we have due to last-mile shenanigans? Until we can address that problem, this seems a bit moot. Perhaps what we need is something like this, but at the state/local level.

Thats why sidewalks are included... having conduit with all new sidewalks would definitely ease the last mile

No, it wouldn't. Because most 'last mile' areas don't have sidewalks. Hell, the roads don't even names beyond "County Road 31".
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