ABOVE: Vector fibre optic cable strung among power lines in Auckland's Forrest Hill as part of the North Shore Education and Access Loop (Neal). The overall picture is no one's idea of a pretty. But the fibre (the darker strand, centre) is barely discer
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ABOVE: Vector fibre optic cable strung among power lines in Auckland's Forrest Hill as part of the North Shore Education and Access Loop (Neal). The overall picture is no one's idea of a pretty. But the fibre (the darker strand, centre) is barely discernable among the existing tangle.
Lines Vector has confirms its formal expression of interest (EOI) in the government’s $300 million plan to take fibre to the country.
The EOI phase closed yesterday. The government will now issue a request for proposal (RFP) for its four-year rural broadband initiative (RBI).
The first round of funding is due to be allocated to the successful bidder(s) in October or November.
In a statement today, Vector said it could utilise its existing power line network to provide “fast and efficient fibre deployment” to 42,000 rural households and 17,500 rural businesses in Rodney to the north of Auckland, and areas to the west and south east of the city.
Yup, that means string it up
A Vector spokeswoman later confirmed NBR’s suspicion that “fast and efficient fibre deployment” meant draping cable over existing overhead power lines (or, to quote her exactly "maximising our existing overhead network in those areas").
That’s a much cheaper- and some say uglier - approach than laying cable in the ground.
Cheaper, faster
Vector chief executive Simon Mackenzie won't disclose the per km cost of rolling out fibre.
But he has previously told NBR that stringing it overhead reduces costs by 60% to 75% (depending on what sort of terrain you’d have to smash through to lay it underground).
A team attaching fibre to power poles can also work much quickly, covering as much as 3km a day, said Mr Mackenzie.
By contrast, even using the most state-of-art directional drilling, an underground team would be lucky to lay 250m of fibre a day.
... and uglier?
Some residents of Tasmania - the first state where roll-out of the $A43 billion national broadband network - have been grousing this week about overhead cable being used to connect around 70% of homes.
But NBR thinks the cable Vector has already strung overhead on Auckland’s North Shore (which is much more streamlined that the older fibre strung around parts of Wellington) is barely noticeable among the general morass of power cables.
Vector said fibre laying fibre to Auckland’s hinterlands would also allow more people to work at home, and ease traffic congestion. Again, NBR agrees. But said traffic should thin whichever company wins the tender.
The rural broadband initiative, is a parallel project to the government’s urban-centered $1.5 billion ultrafast broadband (UFB) Crown fibre tender.
The RBI will be funded in part by a new levy on phone companies, which will replace the old TSO/Kiwishare rural levy from next year.
