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National Broadband Plan - necessary/wasted investment?
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Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 22,986 Mod ✭✭✭✭
Join Date:Posts: 22582
Deleted User wrote: »A lot of rural households have poor mobile phone signals, here I often have to go outside to get a decent signal, same is also true for many of the neighbours, so there is still a need for voice over broadband or via wifi that is then carried over broadband.
Alternatively, you install many small cells in the rural areas with fibre uplinks (to provide the bandwidth).
That is a pretty easily solved problem by putting an aerial on the roof and a microcell. No need for fiber or phone line for that.
Again, their I'm only talking about voice only and the question of if we even need to replace the copper phone network.I was following the Eir deployment closely since I was waiting to benefit from it. So, I've looked at the maps quite a bit. A lot of other people have observed the same thing as well, that in many cases, they just stopped the fibre runs at arbitrary points. It wasn't always run up to a point where the density no longer justified it. A case in point where I live there are a number of cul-de-sac lanes 2-3 km long. They went up each one some distance, with no discernible reduction in density beyond the point they stopped. This would make sense if the strategy was to deploy a fixed amount of fibre but spread as widely across the country. To me that suggests that some chunk of the remaining intervention area should not be that expensive to cover.
That can simply come down to poor GIS and poor planning, it is no indication of cost.
Also if Eir had stayed in the bid and won the contract. Then you would have a point. They could just be extending out from their existing network.
But they didn't. So now you have to remember, that their new company won't be using those Eir fibres and they will need to run their own fibres a couple of km past all those homes that are already serviced by Eir in order to reach those small number of homes beyond that don't currently have service.
And they are also going to need to pay wither Eir or ESB to use their poles and ducts or build their own.
It is all horribly inefficient.Deleted User wrote: »I'll just repeat the point. The horrendous expense is needing it all done in a few years. When the country was dirt poor, we were still able to do essentially the same works, putting up poles, digging trenches etc. It's labour intensive (which in itself means a lot of the investment is going back into local economies) though I think we should have prioritised the work better and staggered it over a longer period.
You answered your own question there. Electrification took 40 years. The building of the phone network was similarly slow.
When my parents ordered their phone line over 40 years ago, it took 2 years to be installed. That was living in a city, just down the road from one of the biggest exchanges in the country, with all the phone lines literally passing outside their garden wall!
It is going to be expensive, because people will want faster speeds now, not 30 years from now.
There is also the issue of labour costs have sky-rocketed since we were a poor country. Back then, we had very high unemployment and labourers were happy to take any bit of work to could get, for almost any money.
Today, we have almost full employment and more seriously, we have again a booming building trade. Pretty much any person with building experience is already happily employed on a building site. That massively raises the labour costs, which I mentioned make up the majority of the cost. It is ironic, but this will end up costing way more today then it would have 40 years ago!
Add to that, the fact that Eir, Siro and Virgin are all busily building out and expanding their networks and the likes of KN and similar with their skilled technicians are already almost completely full out with those network builds.
I've honestly no idea where this new company is going to get the staff to build out such a massive and extensive network. I feel impending doom with this. It just doesn't add up.Deleted User wrote: »Agreed. DSL is coming to the end of its technical capability though and we are going to be faced with the same problem in urban areas soon enough. I repeat the point that sooner or later, the entire country will be using fibre. A lot of the objections to the NBP are based on the completely spurious notion that fibre will be obsolete before long as well.
I'd agree with you, that it would be laughable to claim that Fibre would be obsolete. I don't know anyone with any knowledge of this topic who would say that.
Fibre is what powers the whole internet. Technologies like DSL, HFC, 4G, etc. are all basically fibre most of the way, with just the "last mile" covered by these techs.
I do agree that all of Urban Ireland will end up as FTTP or HFC, after all that is what Eir have already said they are doing.
But the problem with rural Ireland, is that there simply is far too much of it and far too little homes, far too spread out to make it cost effective.Deleted User wrote: »As it happens I live in a rural village and we didn't have DSL. Fibre is a better solution here as well as the surrounding rural area. I don't disagree on the planning system. I'm not an advocate for one-off housing, but we have a legacy to deal with for better or worse.
When other European countries did their rural electrification schemes. They only electrified their villages. Live outside the village, either move to the village or pay the full cost yourself for the electricity to be brought to you.
I know it is a tough and emotional concept. Of course yours and even other village in Ireland should get fibre. You want fibre? Either move to the village or pay the cost yourself of getting it extended to your home.Deleted User wrote: »That wasn't required though. They didn't need cabinets for FTTH. They could have run it from exchanges up to 30km away, which is what they did here. I previously had 1mbit DSL from an exchange around 4 miles away. Most of my neighbours couldn't even get that. The plan was eventually to put a cabinet in the village, but they scrapped that and ran fibre everywhere from the remote exchange. That suggests that for new builds fibre is more cost effective than DSL.
They went with VDSL first in the urban areas, because it was much cheaper and much faster. It will take 10+ year to fibre up every urban Irish home, hell I wouldn't be surprised if it takes 20.
VDSL was rolled out in just 3 - 4 years and it gave most people in urban areas a decent 50 to 100mb/s now. That was preferable to having people stuck on 24mb/s or less and waiting 20 years for fibre.
But they were smart, they knew FTTH would eventually be the future. That VDSL was just a stop gap. So they future proofed it, running lots of extra fibre to each cabinet location and leaving space for the extra splitters and aggregation points there. Remember, urban areas, given the greater density, will require different splits at different places.
It sounds like you are in the areas which has been part of the newer rural fibre builds. Yes, this was launched after the urban VDSL network was completed. They now go with a bit of a different network design for these areas. Though there absolutely are splitters in the field, there has to be. The only cost saving is the lack of a VDSL cab, which in the bigger scheme of things aren't that expensive.
Just putting a VDSL cab in every village, would have been VASTLY cheaper then running fibre, it ain't even close and I can point you to Eir docs and presentations on that.
It is just a case that Eir decided to go the extra mile
and pony up the extra cost of fibre to retain the most profitable customers in these rural villages.
Some might argue it was an attempt to kill the NBP. It has certainly made the NBP wildly more expensive.0 -
The reason they pulled out was more to do with bureacracy that was to be imposed on them, which made least sense in their case, as an existing wholesaler. It seems likely the new owner had other priorities. It doesn't necessarily follow that they couldn't make money out of it.That can simply come down to poor GIS and poor planning, it is no indication of cost.
Also if Eir had stayed in the bid and won the contract. Then you would have a point. They could just be extending out from their existing network.
But they didn't.
I was under the impression that they would use existing dark fibre from Eir. Is that not the case?So now you have to remember, that their new company won't be using those Eir fibres and they will need to run their own fibres a couple of km past all those homes that are already serviced by Eir in order to reach those small number of homes beyond that don't currently have service.
That's a pessimistic view and the risk belongs to the contractor in any case. And as it happens, I know some people who work as installers in other parts of the country. They aren't "building workers" per-se, well at least not trades-men as such. Anyway, the point is that this work will be distributed more evenly in areas that aren't necessarily seeing a building boom. I think they will find the staff easily in many places.And they are also going to need to pay wither Eir or ESB to use their poles and ducts or build their own.
It is all horribly inefficient.
You answered your own question there. Electrification took 40 years. The building of the phone network was similarly slow.
When my parents ordered their phone line over 40 years ago, it took 2 years to be installed. That was living in a city, just down the road from one of the biggest exchanges in the country, with all the phone lines literally passing outside their garden wall!
It is going to be expensive, because people will want faster speeds now, not 30 years from now.
There is also the issue of labour costs have sky-rocketed since we were a poor country. Back then, we had very high unemployment and labourers were happy to take any bit of work to could get, for almost any money.
Today, we have almost full employment and more seriously, we have again a booming building trade. Pretty much any person with building experience is already happily employed on a building site. That massively raises the labour costs, which I mentioned make up the majority of the cost. It is ironic, but this will end up costing way more today then it would have 40 years ago!
Add to that, the fact that Eir, Siro and Virgin are all busily building out and expanding their networks and the likes of KN and similar with their skilled technicians are already almost completely full out with those network builds.
I've honestly no idea where this new company is going to get the staff to build out such a massive and extensive network. I feel impending doom with this. It just doesn't add up.
Yes, that's the harsh economic view. But, it didn't prevail when rural electrification was proposed and it doesn't look like will here either. As I said before the reality on the ground is a bit different between Ireland and other countries. We have a much higher rural population here in low density and DSL broadband would never have worked there, but I stick by my view that fibre is ideal.
I'd agree with you, that it would be laughable to claim that Fibre would be obsolete. I don't know anyone with any knowledge of this topic who would say that.
Fibre is what powers the whole internet. Technologies like DSL, HFC, 4G, etc. are all basically fibre most of the way, with just the "last mile" covered by these techs.
I do agree that all of Urban Ireland will end up as FTTP or HFC, after all that is what Eir have already said they are doing.
But the problem with rural Ireland, is that there simply is far too much of it and far too little homes, far too spread out to make it cost effective.
When other European countries did their rural electrification schemes. They only electrified their villages. Live outside the village, either move to the village or pay the full cost yourself for the electricity to be brought to you.
I know it is a tough and emotional concept. Of course yours and even other village in Ireland should get fibre. You want fibre? Either move to the village or pay the cost yourself of getting it extended to your home.
Splitters are simple passive components though. They aren't comparable with cabinets that need real civil engineering, electricity supply.They went with VDSL first in the urban areas, because it was much cheaper and much faster. It will take 10+ year to fibre up every urban Irish home, hell I wouldn't be surprised if it takes 20.
VDSL was rolled out in just 3 - 4 years and it gave most people in urban areas a decent 50 to 100mb/s now. That was preferable to having people stuck on 24mb/s or less and waiting 20 years for fibre.
But they were smart, they knew FTTH would eventually be the future. That VDSL was just a stop gap. So they future proofed it, running lots of extra fibre to each cabinet location and leaving space for the extra splitters and aggregation points there. Remember, urban areas, given the greater density, will require different splits at different places.
It sounds like you are in the areas which has been part of the newer rural fibre builds. Yes, this was launched after the urban VDSL network was completed. They now go with a bit of a different network design for these areas. Though there absolutely are splitters in the field, there has to be. The only cost saving is the lack of a VDSL cab, which in the bigger scheme of things aren't that expensive.
Maybe they went "the extra mile" but I can't accept that they rejected a VASTLY cheaper solution. I think it's more marginal in some cases at least than you think.Just putting a VDSL cab in every village, would have been VASTLY cheaper then running fibre, it ain't even close and I can point you to Eir docs and presentations on that.
It is just a case that Eir decided to go the extra mile and pony up the extra cost of fibre to retain the most profitable customers in these rural villages.
Some might argue it was an attempt to kill the NBP. It has certainly made the NBP wildly more expensive.0 -
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You need to check who you've quoted here, most of the quotes are not mine.That is a pretty easily solved problem by putting an aerial on the roof and a microcell. No need for fiber or phone line for that.
Again, their I'm only talking about voice only and the question of if we even need to replace the copper phone network.
That can simply come down to poor GIS and poor planning, it is no indication of cost.
Also if Eir had stayed in the bid and won the contract. Then you would have a point. They could just be extending out from their existing network.
But they didn't. So now you have to remember, that their new company won't be using those Eir fibres and they will need to run their own fibres a couple of km past all those homes that are already serviced by Eir in order to reach those small number of homes beyond that don't currently have service.
And they are also going to need to pay wither Eir or ESB to use their poles and ducts or build their own.
It is all horribly inefficient.
You answered your own question there. Electrification took 40 years. The building of the phone network was similarly slow.
When my parents ordered their phone line over 40 years ago, it took 2 years to be installed. That was living in a city, just down the road from one of the biggest exchanges in the country, with all the phone lines literally passing outside their garden wall!
It is going to be expensive, because people will want faster speeds now, not 30 years from now.
There is also the issue of labour costs have sky-rocketed since we were a poor country. Back then, we had very high unemployment and labourers were happy to take any bit of work to could get, for almost any money.
Today, we have almost full employment and more seriously, we have again a booming building trade. Pretty much any person with building experience is already happily employed on a building site. That massively raises the labour costs, which I mentioned make up the majority of the cost. It is ironic, but this will end up costing way more today then it would have 40 years ago!
Add to that, the fact that Eir, Siro and Virgin are all busily building out and expanding their networks and the likes of KN and similar with their skilled technicians are already almost completely full out with those network builds.
I've honestly no idea where this new company is going to get the staff to build out such a massive and extensive network. I feel impending doom with this. It just doesn't add up.
I'd agree with you, that it would be laughable to claim that Fibre would be obsolete. I don't know anyone with any knowledge of this topic who would say that.
Fibre is what powers the whole internet. Technologies like DSL, HFC, 4G, etc. are all basically fibre most of the way, with just the "last mile" covered by these techs.
I do agree that all of Urban Ireland will end up as FTTP or HFC, after all that is what Eir have already said they are doing.
But the problem with rural Ireland, is that there simply is far too much of it and far too little homes, far too spread out to make it cost effective.
When other European countries did their rural electrification schemes. They only electrified their villages. Live outside the village, either move to the village or pay the full cost yourself for the electricity to be brought to you.
I know it is a tough and emotional concept. Of course yours and even other village in Ireland should get fibre. You want fibre? Either move to the village or pay the cost yourself of getting it extended to your home.
They went with VDSL first in the urban areas, because it was much cheaper and much faster. It will take 10+ year to fibre up every urban Irish home, hell I wouldn't be surprised if it takes 20.
VDSL was rolled out in just 3 - 4 years and it gave most people in urban areas a decent 50 to 100mb/s now. That was preferable to having people stuck on 24mb/s or less and waiting 20 years for fibre.
But they were smart, they knew FTTH would eventually be the future. That VDSL was just a stop gap. So they future proofed it, running lots of extra fibre to each cabinet location and leaving space for the extra splitters and aggregation points there. Remember, urban areas, given the greater density, will require different splits at different places.
It sounds like you are in the areas which has been part of the newer rural fibre builds. Yes, this was launched after the urban VDSL network was completed. They now go with a bit of a different network design for these areas. Though there absolutely are splitters in the field, there has to be. The only cost saving is the lack of a VDSL cab, which in the bigger scheme of things aren't that expensive.
Just putting a VDSL cab in every village, would have been VASTLY cheaper then running fibre, it ain't even close and I can point you to Eir docs and presentations on that.
It is just a case that Eir decided to go the extra mile and pony up the extra cost of fibre to retain the most profitable customers in these rural villages.
Some might argue it was an attempt to kill the NBP. It has certainly made the NBP wildly more expensive.0 -
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