Fibre To The Home (FTTH) network

po0k

We, as a country, shouldn't stop for anything less than a new national Fibre-To-The-Kerb network, built by the government, leased to ISPs and Telcos.
Expand and extend the MANs and existing fibre, actually use it.

Moriarty

There's an interview with the IBEC telecoms bod on the SR front page. He mentions that government and business should be planning a ftth network now. I'd agree with him.

He says that it's been estimated that a national ftth network would cost €8billion - not the sort of change you can find down the back of the sofa. To put that in perspective, the entire government expenditure for 2004 is planned to be €31billion.

damien

Moriarty wrote:

the entire government expenditure for 2004 is planned to be €31billion.

The entire government spending on their own telecoms needs is €450m per year. They give Eircom €400m of this.

Moriarty

I'm not saying we shouldn't aim for it or that the government shouldn't do it, just that we should recognise it would be an incredibly capital intensive infrastructure project. There would need to be a lot of political will behind a project like that for it to be taken seriously, never mind to actually begin work on it.

damien

I agree, I just wanted to blurt that figure out somewhere. This thread seemed the most appropriate.

Moriarty

Ripwave

Moriarty wrote:

He says that it's been estimated that a national ftth network would cost €8billion - not the sort of change you can find down the back of the sofa. To put that in perspective, the entire government expenditure for 2004 is planned to be €31billion.

We have something between 1 million and 1 and a half million homes in Ireland - could it really cost between €5K and €8K each to run fibre to them all (even given the number of one off dwellings outside the urban areas)?

FTTH isn't worth that much to the country.

Moriarty

I honestly wouldn't have a clue what the costs would be like. The previous report about a nationwide ftth network pointed out that it would cost far, far less (iirc, less than a third of the quoted figure) to get about 80% of the population onto the network than for universal access. The last 15-20% of the population push the figure up massively.

Certainly in the major towns and citys I would expect the cost per household to work out quite reasonable.

jwt

eh...I read that originally as fifth network. Me was thinking who the hell owns networks two, three and four ???????

FTTH (Fibre to the Home) is not a factor in Irish demographics.

Fair enough in Japan where the population per sqr mile is large but even there it doesn't happen outside of large populations centres it just so happens that major population centres cover most of their landmass.


John

Moriarty

You don't need tokyo-like levels of population density for ftth to work.Telstra in australia is - at this very moment - replacing their copper local loop with fibre. Verizon in the states are - at the moment - deploying ftth in a number of states. Closer to home, there's of course scandanavia. A number of dutch towns and citys are deploying ftth at the moment aswell.

There's countless examples now of ftth deployment around the world. Expecting universal access here in Ireland would be unrealistic, but it's not unrealistic to expect something like that in the towns and citys across the country.

dahamsta

There's no doubt that a national FTTH infrastructure is beyond our means in the short term, but we shouldn't allow people to throw those figures out in order to kill discussion of the subject completely. Gov.ie, ComReg, telcos, ISPs and developers should all be actively considering FTTH on many fronts, from regulatory to actual rollouts. FTTH should be a high priority for high-end city-center apartment buildings for example, followed very closely by FTTC and Gigabit Ethernet internal connectivity. And Gov.ie and ComReg should be telling developers this, quite loudly. Otherwise we're going to continue doing what we've been at for years: Playing catch-up. We need to take the lead on some fronts in order to catch up on others.

adam

Moriarty

I've split this out from this thread.

flamegrill

Are BT in the UK not doing something similar? i.e. replacing a shed load of the copper for fibre?

flame

Ripwave

dahamsta wrote:

FTTH should be a high priority for high-end city-center apartment buildings for example,

This is Ireland - the very areas where FTTH makes most sense are areas that the Government absolutely will not Grant-Aid, and the areas where they will provide grants are the areas where it makes the least economic sense to do FTTH.

Urban Weigl

The question is not whether we can afford a FTTH network. It is whether we can afford NOT to build one now.

LFCFan

People will say we don't need 100Mbit connections, but that NOW. Ireland never seems to plan for the future. There should be a plan in place now to have at least the major towns and cities to be fibre enabled within the next 5 to 8 years. The way we're going, we'll still be on sub 2mbit connections as the norm in 10 years.

jwt

This is Ireland - the very areas where FTTH makes most sense are areas that the Government absolutely will not Grant-Aid, and the areas where they will provide grants are the areas where it makes the least economic sense to do FTTH.

That's why I don't see FTTH happening in Ireland.
Fibre loops increasing to encompass smaller and smaller rural towns yes but not to the homes. Especially if wireless technology keeps progressing at its current rate. Why lay out shedloads of money on fibre and ducting etc when you can drop a wireless base station into a village and every one in a 5 mile radius gets BB.?

In the cities, I don't know.......certainly Dublin, Cork and possibly Limerick could be justified in the city centres, but after that i'm not sure anyone could justify the cost benefit ratio when compared to other technology.

My two cents


John

Urban Weigl

Wireless can not, and never will, deliver the kind of bandwidth when compared to fibre. Wireless is a great solution for remote areas and disaster recovery, however it is "messy" compared to clean fibre.

When I talk about FTTH, I do not mean every home should be connected today. I am talking about a plan, to roll out FTTH on a phased basis. A long term plan, if you will. Sure, a lot of areas, businesses and most government offices would get it today, and likely more than 50% of the population would get it sooner rather than later, however a 100% rollout would be years away (perhaps near 100% availability by 2014). That is where wireless comes in as part of the bigger picture.

Again, the question is not whether Ireland can afford FTTH. It is whether Ireland can afford not to have it.

damien

Verizon started rolling out fibre a few years back in Boston. As they rolled it out they were connecting people up on the way.

I think the future will be a hybrid of both wireless and fibre. If recent history in the telco area has taught us anything is that we should not rely soley on one access method.

jwt

I wasn't suggesting wireless as the only solution, I would see it going into villages and the like.

Wireless can not, and never will, deliver the kind of bandwidth when compared to fibre.

Never said it could, but where fibre is unavailable, unlikely to be available and prohibitively expensive what else is there?

Don't get me wrong I'm all for shooting for the stars and if you miss...etc

But I think a bit of realism is called for.


John

Urban Weigl

jwt wrote:

I wasn't suggesting wireless as the only solution, I would see it going into villages and the like.




Never said it could, but where fibre is unavailable, unlikely to be available and prohibitively expensive what else is there?

Don't get me wrong I'm all for shooting for the stars and if you miss...etc

But I think a bit of realism is called for.


John

I am not, and never will, suggest 100% FTTH coverage for the near future. A FTTH strategy and plan does not mean 100% coverage from day one. This isn't rocket science, it's pretty basic (and realistic) stuff.

jwt

Me thinks we are both saying the same thing just coming at it from different directions.

One of the items I posted here in the past was a spiel about needing to use a variety of technologies to populate BB accross Ireland.

I agree it isn't rocket science but when dealing with gov depts, especially when their own oireachtas report tells them the same thing, you would think degrees from NASA were required

FTTH is a long term, foresighted soution. That in and of itself rules it out of Irish politics

So I'm wide open to suggestions on how to cause it to happen in our lifetimes, or even our kids lifetimes

John

Jorinn

Moriarty wrote:

There's an interview with the IBEC telecoms bod on the SR front page. He mentions that government and business should be planning a ftth network now. I'd agree with him.

He says that it's been estimated that a national ftth network would cost €8billion - not the sort of change you can find down the back of the sofa. To put that in perspective, the entire government expenditure for 2004 is planned to be €31billion.

We had a 4 billion surplus a few years ago didn't we, also that 31 billion is day to spending afaik and excludes infrastructure costs which this would fall under?

eircomtribunal

jwt wrote:

So I'm wide open to suggestions on how to cause it to happen

John

1. Sort out the ducting issue in the building regulation. 80 000 new houses will be built in 2004 alone. So many chances wasted to provide for the future. No action from Cullen yet.

2. Suggest to the Communications Committee something that our elected representatives like to do anyway: Send them on a field trip to European places where fibre deployment is underway or getting started. In this instance they might actually bring home a few good ideas and a little grasp of the issue.

3. Suggest something that our ministers like to do and which is mostly nothing but a waste of money: A pilot project.
Let them use the new MSE to pilot fibre to the home in newly built estates, that can easily be accessed from one of the MANs.

P.

Moriarty

Jorinn wrote:

We had a 4 billion surplus a few years ago didn't we, also that 31 billion is day to spending afaik and excludes infrastructure costs which this would fall under?

Yeah, 4 billion surpluss at the height of the boom. I doubt we'll be seeing that again any time soon. The 31 billion includes all government expenditure, both general and capital expenditure (capex is ~€5billion total for this year). Figures all available on the dept. of finance site.

Eurorunner

Urban Weigl wrote:

The question is not whether we can afford a FTTH network. It is whether we can afford NOT to build one now.

Only too true.

If we are to learn anything from what has happened (or more to the point, not happened) here over the last couple of years, then we should know that we have to make ftth our next goal.

Many of us still dont have broadband as an available option (although its clear that inroads are being made now and this campaign is achieving some of its goals). However, to those who have broadband, I suggest that its not a case of sitting back now - far from it.
We have to learn from the past and not become complacent. Without a continuous ongoing campaign we will fall behind once more.

I am ignorant of what is involved in rolling out this type of technology and would welcome more technical info from those of you who have more experience with fibre - and an idea as to how we could make it work. I would imagine that it would be worthwhile for govt. funds to be allocated to making it available in the cities. Thereafter, is it unrealistic that in less populated areas, local groups could facilitate its provision in a similar manner to the current group data/broadband initiatives? Is it naive to think that fibre could be provided in such a low budget manner?

JWT wrote:

FTTH is a long term, foresighted soution. That in and of itself rules it out of Irish politics

For exactly this reason, we need to dig in NOW for the longhaul. Because the wheels turn that much slower here, we need to have an organised campaign in place so that we achieve the ftth goal within what we consider a realistic timeframe..
The Broadband campaign is far from complete but as it nears completion, there should be no let-up. In fact, this is a solid reason for the continued existance of IrelandOffline.

dahamsta

To break it down to one sentence:

Gov.ie's got it's much needed push on the wireless front now, and it's obviously grasping it, so it's time for us to move on.

adam

DonegalMan

Eurorunner wrote:

However, to those who have broadband, I suggest that its not a case of sitting back now - far from it.
We have to learn from the past and not become complacent.

A very important point.

My own gut feel is that those with wireless are reasonably well future-protected but with the dire state of our network which is going to get even worse due to diminishing Eircom capital investment, those on copper are going to find their 512 connection fast becoming the equivalent of a 28K modem nowadays

damien

Eurorunner wrote:

However, to those who have broadband, I suggest that its not a case of sitting back now - far from it.
We have to learn from the past and not become complacent. Without a continuous ongoing campaign we will fall behind once more.

Think about it. The line failure rate is going up. The investment in the network is going down. Line faults were about a million last year. You may have broadband now, but will you have it in two years ? If it breaks, then what ? Nothing you can do, the USO has told anyone that wants any form of net connection to take a running jump

flamegrill

Bit of news, ill see if i can get details for everyone.

My brother got a new job (who gives a fiddlers ya say?). Well its for a new company building a new housing estate with over 850 houses. The plan is to have 10mbit/s net connection pre-configured into each and every house.

If i get more details, which should be possible over the next few days, as he only started last friday. I'll post them.

Paul

aphex™

I think you're all getting worked up over nothing. Bt said they plan a rollout in 2010. They are only planning it now. Infact they announced they are PLANNING FTTH.

Eircom are trialing it in an estate in my area.

Seems to me: Getting broadband to the regional towns- mission accomplished. Wait a while and see whats next. See what private companies do with liscences providing the last mile.