| reply to NormanS
Re: Pond scum subspecies Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. Their customers have to suffer service outages. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground. |
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 NormanSPremium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
kudos:9
 ·SONIC.NET
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| said by silbaco:Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. Their customers have to suffer service outages. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground.
Haven't had a storm blow shit off the poles, here, in more than 50 years. Had buried shit severely messed up in San Francisco twice since 1906.
--
Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum |
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| It is an extremely common occurrence in the Midwest. Or trees falling on lines. Google will find that out sooner or later. Kansas city is in an area that can get ice storms too, although not overly common there. Ice will bring down everything. |
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brad
join:2007-09-06
Etobicoke, ON | reply to silbaco
said by silbaco:Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. Their customers have to suffer service outages. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground.
Are you going to provide the millions in additional capital it would take to do so? |
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| Google has the money.
The cost of putting lines in the ground often times pays for itself in the long run. But companies don't like to think long term. |
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brad
join:2007-09-06
Etobicoke, ON | said by silbaco:Google has the money.
The cost of putting lines in the ground often times pays for itself in the long run. But companies don't like to think long term.
Yes, they're rolling out an all fibre network but they're not thinking long term. |
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Reviews:
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| reply to silbaco
Of course, backhoes, boring machines, large augers, etc., never damage cable. Water never gets into cables, etc. Sorry, but the expense and time to fix a damaged buried, or underground cable is most usually longer and more costly than a repair of an aerial cable due to the necessity to accurately locate the the damage, than have it dug up, and then repaired. Not to mention that damages to aerial cables are much easier to find.
Several years ago, the cost for burying cable here in the rock (rock starts about 6 inches to 1 foot below grade was in the neighborhood of $4 to $5 dollars per foot. |
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 morboComplete Your Transaction
join:2002-01-22
00000 | reply to silbaco
Too bad the solution for downed lines is to abandon service, not fix the downed lines. We've all seen how electric companies never repair downed power lines. |
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| reply to brad
They are deploying fiber because it would be idiotic to deploy copper. |
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Reviews:
·Verizon FiOS
 ·DIRECTV
 ·Optimum Online
·Cablevision
| reply to NormanS
Living in NJ, even before Sandy I can say that downed wires are extremely common, in CA I'm sure you don't have as many powerful storms as we do in NJ.
Some areas in NJ have underground wires, normally the richer areas, they don't lose power or phone as often as the areas served by poles, and even when they do, the power comes back much faster, because the problem is centralized, normally it's the transformer itself, downed lines take much longer and are more costly to fix.
In NJ we've always wanted underground wires, even more so since Sandy.
Does it cost more, yes obviously. But in some areas it really would make much more sense in the long run. |
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 tschmidtPremium,MVM
join:2000-11-12
Milford, NH
kudos:8
·G4 Communications
·Fairpoint Commun..
 ·Hollis Hosting
| reply to silbaco
said by silbaco:Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Saving money is not irrelevant, lowering infrastructure cost goes a long way to increasing penetration. Aerial infrastructure is enough of an eyesore already, I don't want separate poles for: power, phone, Cable, Etc.
said by silbaco: Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground.
I respectfully disagree. Here in NH most utilities are above ground. In the thirty years we have lived here have lost power dozens of times, sometimes for a week on end. We have never once lost phone service. When a tree falls on aerial service the power cables break the fall so tree gets hung up and usually does not sever cable or phone service.
Same thing in a traffic accident. Down pole may short out power conductors but communication cables are rarely damaged.
Underground service costs about 10X what aerial does and it is not immune to disruption: frost heaves and errant backhoes play havoc with underground service. In addition it is much harder to find and repair underground faults.
If I had my druthers we would implement some type of wholesale fiber first-mile implementation. Various service providers would rent strands or lambdas (colors) to deliver end user service. Primary and secondary power would be at the top of the pole, multi-fiber cable underneath and all the existing legacy cable, phone, cable, fire alarm, etal removed.
In dense urban environments underground utilities make sense but that is the exception not the rule. If you want to pay the premium that is fine but it should not be the norm due to expense.
By way of example our house is 600 feet off the road. When we built it decided to go aerial for the first 400 feet then underground for the last couple of hundred. Neither has been a problem.
/tom |
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tschmidtPremium,MVM
join:2000-11-12
Milford, NH
kudos:8 Reviews:
·G4 Communications
·Fairpoint Commun..
·Hollis Hosting
| reply to silbaco
said by silbaco:Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Saving money is not irrelevant, lowering infrastructure cost goes a long way to increasing penetration. Aerial infrastructure is enough of an eyesore already, I don't want separate poles for: power, phone, Cable, Etc.
said by silbaco: Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground.
I respectfully disagree. Here in NH most utilities are above ground. In the thirty years we have lived here have lost power dozens of times, sometimes for a week on end. We have never once lost phone service. When a tree falls on aerial service the power cables break the fall so tree gets hung up and usually does not sever cable or phone service.
Same thing in a traffic accident. Down pole may short out power conductors but communication cables are rarely damaged.
Underground service costs about 10X what aerial does and it is not immune to disruption: frost heaves and errant backhoes play havoc with underground service. In addition it is much harder to find and repair underground faults.
If I had my druthers we would implement some type of wholesale fiber first-mile implementation. Various service providers would rent strands or lambdas (colors) to deliver end user service. Primary and secondary power would be at the top of the pole, multi-fiber cable underneath and all the existing legacy cable, phone, cable, fire alarm, etal removed.
In dense urban environments underground utilities make sense but that is the exception not the rule. If you want to pay the premium that is fine but it should not be the norm due to expense.
/tom |
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| reply to tschmidt
I have never seen phone lines placed above ground, so I can't comment on that. But I have seen ice bring down power and fiber. |
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| reply to NormanS
said by NormanS:said by silbaco:Other utilities should not be on poles either. It's just an attempt to save money that doesn't really work. If you don't own the poles, then you have to pay to use them. Every time a storm blows in you have to role trucks to fix the downed lines. Their customers have to suffer service outages. They should just do it right the first time and put the cables in the ground.
Haven't had a storm blow shit off the poles, here, in more than 50 years. Had buried shit severely messed up in San Francisco twice since 1906. That's because you live in one of the most temperate climates in the United States, not Tornado Alley. Your storms are probably nothing compared to what we get here. |
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 Simba7I Void Warranties
join:2003-03-24
Billings, MT | reply to brad
said by brad:Yes, they're rolling out an all fibre network but they're not thinking long term. Um.. Yes they are. Copper can't push the speeds Fiber can. Copper has limits. Fiber, technically, does not. |
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| reply to morbo
Fixing lines is costly. Replacing poles is even more costly. As the poles continue to age in many places, companies are being reminded how stupid it was not to bury the cables. |
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brad
join:2007-09-06
Etobicoke, ON | reply to Simba7
said by Simba7:said by brad:Yes, they're rolling out an all fibre network but they're not thinking long term. Um.. Yes they are. Copper can't push the speeds Fiber can. Copper has limits. Fiber, technically, does not. Do I have to put sarcasm tags around it for you?
The comment was making fun of the other thing he said. |
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brad
join:2007-09-06
Etobicoke, ON | reply to tschmidt
said by tschmidt:If I had my druthers we would implement some type of wholesale fiber first-mile implementation. Various service providers would rent strands or lambdas (colors) to deliver end user service. Primary and secondary power would be at the top of the pole, multi-fiber cable underneath and all the existing legacy cable, phone, cable, fire alarm, etal removed.
That would be the most ideal situation. |
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| reply to morbo
Where did you have electric power companies not fixed downed lines? I have never seen that action taken after a storm. |
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NormanSPremium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
kudos:9 Reviews:
·SONIC.NET
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| reply to sticks435
said by sticks435:That's because you live in one of the most temperate climates in the United States, not Tornado Alley. Your storms are probably nothing compared to what we get here.
But we have earthquakes up the kazoo. With sufficient lateral displacement of the earth, you can kiss your buried utilities goodbye.
What works in one place may fail in another.
--
Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum |
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