US Broadband Buildout Finds Cost to Connect Some Households as High as $53,000 (msn.com) 48
Internet services has long been slow for the Winnebago Tribe in the state of Nebraska, reports the Wall Street Journal. Now the U.S. government "plans to fix that by crisscrossing the reservation with fiber-optic cable — at an average cost of $53,000 for each household and workplace connected."
While that amount exceeds the assessed value of some of the 658 homes getting hookups — at a cost of $35.2 million — "the tribe is also starting an internet company to run the network, creating jobs and competing with an existing provider known for slow customer service." While most connections will cost far less, the expense to reach some remote communities has triggered concerns over the ultimate price tag for ensuring every rural home, business, school and workplace in America has the same internet that city dwellers enjoy... The U.S. has committed more than $60 billion for what the Biden administration calls the "Internet for All" program, the latest in a series of sometimes troubled efforts to bring high-speed internet to rural areas... Providing fiber-optic cable is the industry standard, but alternative options such as satellite service are cheaper, if less reliable. Congress has left it up to state and federal officials implementing the program to decide how much is too much in hard-to-reach areas...
Defenders of the broadband programs say a simple per-location cost doesn't capture their benefits. Once built, rural fiber lines can be used to upgrade cell service or to add more connections to nearby towns...
Some of the differences can be explained by the distinct geographic areas the programs are targeting. While the FCC program included some suburbs and excluded remote locations such as Alaska, the programs run by Commerce and USDA specifically targeted far-flung regions with difficult construction conditions. "These are some of the most challenging locations that there are to reach in America," said Andy Berke, administrator of the USDA's Rural Utilities Service. He cited one project in Alaska that involves a 793-mile undersea fiber cable to reach remote villages.
While that amount exceeds the assessed value of some of the 658 homes getting hookups — at a cost of $35.2 million — "the tribe is also starting an internet company to run the network, creating jobs and competing with an existing provider known for slow customer service." While most connections will cost far less, the expense to reach some remote communities has triggered concerns over the ultimate price tag for ensuring every rural home, business, school and workplace in America has the same internet that city dwellers enjoy... The U.S. has committed more than $60 billion for what the Biden administration calls the "Internet for All" program, the latest in a series of sometimes troubled efforts to bring high-speed internet to rural areas... Providing fiber-optic cable is the industry standard, but alternative options such as satellite service are cheaper, if less reliable. Congress has left it up to state and federal officials implementing the program to decide how much is too much in hard-to-reach areas...
Defenders of the broadband programs say a simple per-location cost doesn't capture their benefits. Once built, rural fiber lines can be used to upgrade cell service or to add more connections to nearby towns...
Some of the differences can be explained by the distinct geographic areas the programs are targeting. While the FCC program included some suburbs and excluded remote locations such as Alaska, the programs run by Commerce and USDA specifically targeted far-flung regions with difficult construction conditions. "These are some of the most challenging locations that there are to reach in America," said Andy Berke, administrator of the USDA's Rural Utilities Service. He cited one project in Alaska that involves a 793-mile undersea fiber cable to reach remote villages.
Wireless (Score:4, Informative)
Maybe a few cell towers might be a better idea? A nice one costs around $500,000. A single modern 5G tower can handle 700 simultaneous high-speed connections no problem.
Re:Wireless (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe a few cell towers might be a better idea? A nice one costs around $500,000. A single modern 5G tower can handle 700 simultaneous high-speed connections no problem.
Hard to day. It could be that in many of these areas, homes are so spread out each tower would only reach a handful. Being able to handle 700 connections would be overkill. Plus, what to cell towers use for an uplink? Do they need a fiber connection?
In any case, it would be interesting to know why ISPs aren't pursuing lower-cost options. I strongly suspect the program was designed such that you only get the subsidy if you lay a physical connection. Either that or the subsidy for fixed wireless is much, much less than laying fiber.
Re:Wireless (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wireless (Score:4, Interesting)
For Nebraska this might be a solution in Appalachia not so much from experience. All of these things like line of sight to work well.
In hill country line of sight is often tough. Where is the old farm house? Down by the creek of course, where is the creek, down in the notch. Even when the contour of the earth isn't the issue, the trees are.
There are old jokes about the sun only shining a few hours a day in Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, and Western parts of Virginia. They are not totally fictional accounts.
Trying to hit some of these places with any of cellular, point-to-point RF, any even low orbit stuff like Starlink is often painful and needs a lot of repeaters, making it almost as costly as stringing cable and a whole lot less reliable.
Re:Wireless (Score:4)
My parents visited their hometowns recently, up in the Adirondack mountains. I imagine the problems are much the same as with the Appalachian chain.
Zero coverage in most areas for cellphones. I'd imagine that you could fix that, but you'd need to install more cellular towers, and even with intelligent placement on mountain tops - running infrastructure up to those mountaintops would be expensive. You'd either need to run power up there, in which case dragging a fiber line with it wouldn't be a big deal, or go renewable, with the commiserate extra maintenance and the sheer amount of infrastructure cost - remember, solar panels would need a way to clean themselves of snow, for example. To be reliable you'd need a massive battery bank, which means you might want to have a climate controlled facility to store them in for longevity purposes, and keep in mind that we're looking at high altitude structures pretty far north - which means extreme freezing temperatures.
No matter what you do, it's going to be expensive. Starlink might indeed be the best solution.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: Wireless (Score:1)
This is about if a community is relevant enough to have layer 1/layer 2 infrastructure or a quick fix with layer 3 to end node support consisting of cell towers. Fiber can carry everything the region will ever need for the foreseeable future including cell tower links as the post I'm responding to has mentioned. The quick fix is standard feasibility logic and the same reasoning western nations give for dropping cell networks in the middle of developing regions. I'm thinking it should not apply in this or si
Re: (Score:2)
Any radio system is always going to be inferior simply by the nature of the shared medium that is subject to interference.
Just install fibre once, like we installed copper phone lines to every part of the country. Those lines will be good for many decades, probably centuries, and give everyone reliable and fast broadband.
Re: Wireless (Score:2)
If you read the article, it mentions a benefit the fibre will provide: upgraded cell service.
Re: (Score:3)
My first reaction was something on the lines of the economic definition of inflation relating to poor resource allocation, but the reality as a country is that we need to link people together and to the broader population.
I'm sure $1 Billion or so will be spent on areas that today are not economically rational to hook up, but the infrastructure is hopefully a 50-year+ investment and the point is universality. Most of this is work that should have been done 20+ years ago.
Now, putting my socialist hat on, I
Re: Wireless (Score:2)
The connection speeds required to be offered can't be provided by wireless, these are houses/residences getting (in some cases) several miles of private fiber strung directly to their location, all paid for by the neighbors they worked so hard to be no where near.
This is why providers didn't connect these addresses - there's no business model that can reimburse an ISP for a $53K PER RESIDENCE hook-up. But maybe this will FINALLY force Democrats to stop announcing their annual "we're making sure everyone in
Almost like (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the most expensive to connect places that are still left to connect...
No, that's not the cost, that's the price... (Score:2)
Cost = Materials + Labor
Price = Materials + Labor + Passive Income
Our government is getting ripped off by the private sector and no one believes the cover story anymore. This puff piece is designed to justify price gouging on a public good of great importance.
Re: (Score:2)
Okay, tell us the cost difference then.
Re: (Score:2)
Why even include labor? Shouldn't those guys just work for free?
Guess what, companies have to exist, buy and maintain expensive equipment, manage that labor, keep a lot of insurance for said labor, locate and track all the pre-existing utilities, have insurance to cover hitting them anyway, etc. This isn't some just-exist-to-skim-off-the-top type setup, it's a significant undertaking.
Re: (Score:2)
That all goes onto the "cost" portion of the equation though, what OP is talking about is the "profits" which is what is left after all those things you mentioned.
Re: No, that's not the cost, that's the price... (Score:2)
Why should ISPs be denied a profit?
If you want to have zero-profit, why not have the local municipalities simply roll out their own fiber plant, then the local government can offer the internet services for cost? I'm sure BumFork North Dakota city council will do a bang-up job stringing fiber with a little help for the community. And while we're at it, why don't we have local gov't subsidize those rollouts? Why should I in Florida pay to connect hill people in West Virginia?
Maybe we set up the wrong goals (Score:3)
"ensuring every rural home, business, school and workplace in America has the same internet that city dwellers enjoy"
This is sayin "we want to live with city amenities, without the cost of living in a city"
Don't worry, we do the opposite as well, with urban sprawl, we want to have country style large lots, without moving too far away from the city, causing all kinds of societal issues, primarily high housing prices.
Maybe let cities and rural areas focus on their strengths, and solve the issues in another way? (Wireless / satellite, plus a slow but reliable cable backup)?
Re: Maybe we set up the wrong goals (Score:1)
Access to the internet and broadband is pretty fundamental. I challenge anyone try watching broadcast television for 90 days.....
Re: (Score:1)
Access to the internet and broadband is pretty fundamental. I challenge anyone try watching broadcast television for 90 days.....
Uh, lots of people still watch cable all day. I can't stand it but whatever floats yer boat.
Thing is, and I've made this point a number of times, is the FCC definition of broadband is way, way higher than your average bear needs. I think they're shooting for at least 100/100 service for each home. You don't need that to email, stream Netflix, or even work remote. Assuming reasonable latency, I'm sure I could attend Zoom meetings at around 10-25 Mbps. Maybe you won't get the best gaming experience but I find
Re: Maybe we set up the wrong goals (Score:1)
Fiber I think is not deployed to strictly accommodate end to end connectivity, not even mostly. It's a layer 2 medium. And its worth is how much traffic it can handle to and from other networks. If the region is relevant or if they want it to be in the future then fiber is deployed. The telcos have shown this in the past by overprovisioning parts of the country they "liked" just to get government funding most of which was ripped up or never used. And ironicly most of that was provisioned incorrectly using e
Re: Maybe we set up the wrong goals (Score:2)
We're not talking ACCESS, we're talking connection speed. The issue is "high-spied"/broadband access, not, "I can't place a door dash order!"
The ability to stream multiple HD videos across several devices is not a 'fundamental right'.
Re: (Score:1)
From the article: "The tribe lives in Nebraska after being forcibly moved several times in the 19th century."
So that whole attitude of yours can fuck right off. They're there because nobody else wanted that land, it was such shit. They were forced to move there BECAUSE it was far away from anything of real interest.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: Maybe we set up the wrong goals (Score:2)
This is an edge case, we are not spending $53K per home to wire just Indian reservations...
Re: (Score:1)
Did you feel the same way about electricity?
If only there was a high-speed satellite network (Score:4, Funny)
If only there was a high-speed satellite network available that you could subscribe to in these rural areas
Re: (Score:3)
If you're talking Starlink, there's only so much sky-junk you can boost into low orbit before you start affecting other missions. Remember that all those LEO terminals have pretty short lifecycles before they get deorbited and need to be replaced. Cell towers, at least, have lifespans measured in decades.
When I was in Costa Rica a few years ago I was amazed at the amount of fiber that was run everywhere, at least from San Jose west to the Pacific coast around Quepos. The speeds weren't great but the connect
Re: (Score:3)
If you're talking Starlink, there's only so much sky-junk you can boost into low orbit before you start affecting other missions. Remember that all those LEO terminals have pretty short lifecycles before they get deorbited and need to be replaced. Cell towers, at least, have lifespans measured in decades.
When I was in Costa Rica a few years ago I was amazed at the amount of fiber that was run everywhere, at least from San Jose west to the Pacific coast around Quepos. The speeds weren't great but the connections were there and seemingly pretty reliable.
Starlink is already in use in rural and remote areas. $600 in equipment and $110/month service. That seems better than $53,000 for the connection.
Sure, fiber might be better but so what? Everything is a cost benefit tradeoff
There are already 4500 in orbit. The satellite lifespan is factored into the service cost.
It's pretty cool tech
Re: (Score:2)
This.
Let Musk worry about his ROI. At the prices he's charging, it seems like a decent solution. And the sky-junk is going up anyway.
Re: If only there was a high-speed satellite netwo (Score:2)
The difference is Joe Biden is making your neighbors pay the $53K to wire your house, with Starlink the homeowner pays the $600 equipment cost.
The phrase "cost effective" never came up when drafting this plan/legislation.
Apparently, this somehow "reduces inflation", just another example of "Bidenomics" working to lower the costs for working American families, or something...
Re: (Score:2)
Starlink (Score:2)
Why not Starlink? A reason other than Elon Musk is an asshole (he is, no dispute there — he stole Starlink from WorldVu) would be nice.
So? (Score:1)
I'll hear your complaining after the last terminal is hooked up. Cheaters, losers. Woe is you fucking do the job.
The $400 billion broadband scandal (Score:1)
Google that if you're curious how corrupt the federal government is, how married they are to big business, how much money was given to the last century's telecoms, and why the US pays so much for internet access.
What a deal! (Score:1)
Comcast wants $63,000 for an 1/8 mile run from two houses down from mine.
The Town refuses to enforce their franchise agreement.
Re: What a deal! (Score:2)
I suspect they are not running the connection 1/8 mile, I suspect for very good reason the two houses are served by different facilities, they likely have to dig up roadways, restore landscaping, do environmental impact studies, and secure permits from local gov't. They don't just roll a trencher and @go for it!"
Demand equality (Score:2)
Are they also going to ensure that city dwellers enjoy the same amount of land per person that rural dwellers enjoy?
Choice of living location has natural consequences. It shouldn't be up to the taxpayers to eliminate them.
Re: Demand equality (Score:2)
We now live in a post-consequences world!
Chose to go to college, but can't find a job to pay your loans? Uncle Joe has your back!
No one need suffer the consequences for any decision they make!
Because the Indian tribes were given such choice.. (Score:2)
I guess you did not notice that the story here is about an Indian tribal reservation... funny enough the tribes were not given a whole lot of choice about where their reservation lands are located.
This is why Verizon halted FiOS and sold the rest (Score:2)
This is why Verizon halted most FiOS deployments and sold the rest to Frontier.
The cost for fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) is so prohibitive that even Verizon FiOS gave up on it. They're only deploying to locations in Washington DC and New York City because they were sued to not stop deployment there.
Hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC), with fiber to the neighborhood and copper coaxial cable to the home is far more affordable and only slightly slower on upload speeds than fiber with the latest DOCSIS 3.x and 4.x protocol
Ridiculous high costs for some rural users? (Score:2)
This is why God invented Starlink. Fiber is more efficient in densely populated places.