[LINK] fibre distance issues?

[Adrian Chadd]

G'day,

Could someone please decode Coonan's relayed statement from an Optus
Engineer about fibre builds and the new broadband system, as quoted
here:

http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/24/2069263.htm?section=justin

Senator Coonan seized on the comments made by Optus engineer Peter Ferris
at a summit in Sydney yesterday who rejected Labor's plan.

Senator Coonan says there are obvious technical problems with the proposal.

"Industry has pretty much established that it would be both physically and
technically impossible to reach 98% of the population with a fibre build,"
she said.

"The technical limitations are of course that the fibre doesn't go beyond
1.5 kilometres of a telephone exchange or a node."

Uhm, any ideas?





Adrian