[LINK] How far the fibre?

[Richard Chirgwin]

Stilgherrian wrote:
> On 10/7/07 8:06 AM, "Marghanita da Cruz" <marghanita at ramin.com.au> wrote:
>   
>> There could be a number of explanations for fibre to your "rural" home in the
>> hunter valley.
>>
>> A. You are in close proximity to Sydney and Newcastle (Newcastle is larger
>> than
>> Canberra and Hobart, and possibly Darwin) So, based on urban projections, it
>> would be a sensible investment.
>>
>> B. Fibre is possibly cheaper than copper to lay - particularly for long hauls.
>> It is the termination equipment and management(personnel) that is "expensive".
>>
>> C. The Fibre can reticulated through wireless for the last 300 metres.
>>     
>
> IIRC, back in the mid-90s the local authorities (councils?) in the Newcastle
> and Hunter Valley areas were actively promoting the region as a high-tech
> hub, since the future they saw in coal, steel and shipbuilding (!) wasn't a
> happy one. I seem to remember them subsidizing a lot of fibre to attract
> high-tech firms out of Sydney.
>
> All based on very hazy memories of the dot-com boom -- ring any bells for
> anyone?
>   
First, 2c worth for David - and others I guess. I don't know whether 
what passes you is fibre serving exchanges, or fibre serving long-haul 
trunk routes. If it's the long-haul between Sydney and Brisbane, then it 
stops at exchanges in major centres for add-drop, not at every possible 
place along the way. All the long-hauls pass through towns, but not all 
the towns get drop-off points (and this is not just a Telstra quirk, 
take a look at any national-scale fibre map).

Regarding Stil's memory, you're roughly correct. The "big thing" was to 
get Canada's SaskTel to pour buckets of dollars into Hunter fibre. It 
got announced lots of times, but it never happened. I recall talking to 
a Canadian journalist at one point; his opinion was that the SaskTel 
management of the day was much better at announcement than at execution.

RC
> Stil
>
>
>