If fibers being cut is the culprit here, does going with a supplier like
Qwest make sense because their fibers are running down railroad right of
ways and, therefore, should be less succeptible to a backhoe digging where
it shouldn't be? Or are you looking at other, more secure mediums for the
bulk of your traffic?
Scott Landman wrote:
If fibers being cut is the culprit here, does going with a supplier like
Qwest make sense because their fibers are running down railroad right of
only if the train doesn't jump track and rip all that beautiful fiber up
for the next half mile 
I was under the impression that there was one fiber giant that actually
owns its own fiber, and that its name is AT&T... Who is Qwest???
Anyone have any stats on how much MCI, Sprint, WCom actually own?
Charles
~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~
Charles Sprickman Internet Channel
INCH System Administration Team (212)243-5200
spork@inch.com access@inch.com
If you're suggesting that Qwest is the only carrier using railroad right
of ways I suggest you take a closer look at those little orange posts
running along the side of train tracks.. I've seen MCI, Worldcom, AT&T,
sprint and others running along the same tracks from Seattle to
Portland.
nm
All the major carriers, including AT&T, cross lease capacity and swap fibers
with each other. It's not unusual to see things like Sprint fiber with
Worldcom repeaters, and Worldcom fibers with Sprint repeaters.
Carrier incest is alive and well, and no one is excepted, which makes
diversity planning of physical plant difficult from a customer perspective.
As for who Qwest is, you should check out http://www.qwest.net. Part of their
former name might be more familiar, SP Construction Services. (SP as in
Southern Pacific)
-dorian
Ha! There are at least 3 major fiber runs paralleling the old SP (now
CalTrain) train tracks from SF to SJ. These tracks run under 280 on the
south side of the city, and 280 is being retrofitted. There is lots and
LOTS of deep digging going on, in fact I saw a pile of those "don't dig
here" orange posts in a scrap pile next to the construction when I was
waling around there last week.
I remember signs for AT&T, Wiltel and Sprint on the same post, and I think
MCI but I'm not positive. One minor backhoe missup and there is a serious
outage in the city here.
Isn't "SPRINT" an acronym for "Southern Pacific Railroad blah blah"?
Charles Sprickman wrote:
> If fibers being cut is the culprit here, does going with a supplier
like
> Qwest make sense because their fibers are running down railroad
right ofI was under the impression that there was one fiber giant that
actually
owns its own fiber, and that its name is AT&T... Who is Qwest???
Last name Qwest. First name Johnny. Hangs out with an Arab kid and a
pug!
Anyone have any stats on how much MCI, Sprint, WCom actually own?
AT&T has the most extensive network, but also the oldest. They've got a
lot of copper in there. MCI leases the majority of their backbone, but
does have their own fiber too. Sprint has a national fiber backbone as
does WCom. Both are upgrading and closing off their spurrs of which
WCom has more. Sprint is only upgrading to OC-48 whereas WCom is going
to OC-192. We also have our own backbone between Seattle and Vancouver,
B.C. for now. (Watch for the press releases). Qwest is laying a network
that will also serve as the backbones for GTE, Frontier and ICG. The
Williams Co. (founders of WilTel) is also laying fiber again. Look for
them.
As to railroad right-of-ways, they will only let you within 30 feet of
the tracks, which is still in the ror. It is safer than anywhere else
because of the difficulty of getting permits to dig in railroad ror (5+
years here in Washington) even for other utilities. Some idiot with a
backhoe can still be way of target though and get you. Derailments and
floods are also big problems in rr-ror. The only real protection you
have is ringed SONET, however, even in that arrangment some carriers do
not have the ability to reroute everything, just the priority stuff. So
they'll still have outages. It's all a matter of capacity and what
electronics they use.
I think the fiber Williams Co. has in the ground (most of the old WilTel
network) is much safer then fiber laid next to tracks. If people see
a sign that says "Fiber cable, do not dig" or "High pressure gas line, do
not dig" the latter gets much more attention. Last time I talked to
someone as Williams they were saying they never have had a cut along the
gas pipeline.
Nathan Stratton President, NetRail,Inc.
Nathan Stratton wrote:
I think the fiber Williams Co. has in the ground (most of the old
WilTel
network) is much safer then fiber laid next to tracks. If people see
a sign that says "Fiber cable, do not dig" or "High pressure gas line,
do
not dig" the latter gets much more attention. Last time I talked to
someone as Williams they were saying they never have had a cut along
the
gas pipeline.Nathan Stratton President, NetRail,Inc.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phone (888)NetRail NetRail, Inc.
Fax (404)522-1939 230 Peachtree Suite 500WWW http://www.netrail.net/ Atlanta, GA 30303
---------------------------------
--------------------------------------
"No king is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his
great strength. - Psalm 33:16
You're right. I forgot about the decomissioned pipelines. Although,
you'd be surprised how stupid some of these morons with backhoes are! I
remember a major MCI cut along their west coast route a few years ago
that took out the entire northwest for 8 hours. The guy was 600 yards
away from where his permit allowed him to dig. He stopped when he cut
the fiber and shut his hoe down. When they got out there, they found
that he was digging right next to train tracks, was inches from cutting
a high voltage power line that surely would have killed him, and was
also fairly close to a gas line.
The moral: Redundancy, Redundancy, Redundancy!
Scott Yoneyama wrote:
Nathan Stratton wrote:
>
> I think the fiber Williams Co. has in the ground (most of the old
> WilTel
> network) is much safer then fiber laid next to tracks. If people see
> a sign that says "Fiber cable, do not dig" or "High pressure gas line,
> do
> not dig" the latter gets much more attention. Last time I talked to
> someone as Williams they were saying they never have had a cut along
> the
> gas pipeline.
>
> Nathan Stratton President, NetRail,Inc.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Phone (888)NetRail NetRail, Inc.
> Fax (404)522-1939 230 Peachtree Suite 500
>
> WWW http://www.netrail.net/ Atlanta, GA 30303
> ---------------------------------
> --------------------------------------
> "No king is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his
> great strength. - Psalm 33:16You're right. I forgot about the decomissioned pipelines. Although,
you'd be surprised how stupid some of these morons with backhoes are! I
remember a major MCI cut along their west coast route a few years ago
that took out the entire northwest for 8 hours. The guy was 600 yards
away from where his permit allowed him to dig. He stopped when he cut
the fiber and shut his hoe down. When they got out there, they found
that he was digging right next to train tracks, was inches from cutting
a high voltage power line that surely would have killed him, and was
also fairly close to a gas line.The moral: Redundancy, Redundancy, Redundancy!
--
Scott Yoneyama
Director
Starcom
(206) 448-4034
(206) 448-4485 fax
yone@wolfenet.com"The only way between Canada and the U.S. and all points along the way"
Speaking of Wiltel, 1998 marks the end of their non-competition
agreement with WorldComm. Wiltels' Martin intends on using more
of their "lazy assets" to become a player in a big way once again
in the carrier market.
-pete
Speaking of Wiltel, 1998 marks the end of their non-competition
agreement with WorldComm. Wiltels' Martin intends on using more
of their "lazy assets" to become a player in a big way once again
in the carrier market.-pete
Careful, Worldcom owns the rights to the name Wiltel for (I believe)
another 7 years. It's The Williams Company.
Wow. An engineering-driven carrier.
Thank Ghod!
Cheers,
-- jra