Hi,
Does anyone know if there's fibre resiliency between Calgary and Toronto over the Great lakes, I thinking redundancy could be achieved by using two paths one following the railroad and the other following the Trans-Canadian highway. Does anyone know if there is fibre following the Trans-Canadian highway and who owns it?
Is this achievable?
Thanks,
Jacques
CTO, CIRA
More than likely one around lake Superior on CP Rail tracks, and the
other along the CN tracks further north.
Zayo in Canada is formerly CNCP telecommunications, and they are likely
first to have fibre along tracks.
Since the Trans Canada highway in that part of Ontario is actually a 2
lane rural road, I am not sure people would have laid fibre along it
knowing the progressive work to widen it might require frequent
relocation of the fibre.
BTW,
a web site showing list of registered cellular towers in Canada:
http://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html
In areas where the 17 or 11 stray from railroad, you could cobine that
map with Street View to try to spot towers to see if they are on
microwave or not.
If I were to cycle the route again, I would be able to spot signs of
fibre along the road. (do not dig, or orange tags on telephone pole
lines where they exist).
There may be stretches where there is fibre along the 17 (between
Sudbury and White River, there are no through tracks, and a few towns,
so one assumes some fibre has been laid).
The folks at ViaNet.ca have laid FTTH in towns such as Chapleau, so they
would know what fibre trunks exist in the region.
Since the Trans Canada highway in that part of Ontario is actually a 2 lane
rural road, I am not sure people would have laid fibre along it knowing the
progressive work to widen it might require frequent relocation of the fibre.
That's a good point, what about along the Trans-Canadian pipeline? TC Energy — Contractors, Suppliers and Vendors Anyone know if there's fibre there?
Answer from Allstream (aka Zayo)
A combination: Tor-Ott-Mtl N route is CP & S route is CN. From Tor-Wpg
its mostly CN on the N route and the S goes thru various US routes.
So Allstream would get you out west via the more northern CN line from
Toronto.
So you would need to find someone who has fibre along the CP line.
(note: Ottawa to North Bay, the tracks have been removed a couple years
ago, not sure if there is any fibre left.
What is interesting is Allstream saying Tor-Ott-Mtl route is on CP. CP's
transcontinental line from Montreal-Ottawa-Sudbury no longer exists.
(Rigaud to Ottawa is Trans Canada Trail now). But CP still has its
Smoth Falls to Montreal line. (and at the DOrion commuter train station
(CP tracks) there are "do not dig" signs from Allstream.
On a somewhat related note, if anyone has KMZs of the railway-based ROWs
from Calgary-Vancouver (Fraser Valley area) and is able to share them,
please contact me off list. I'm hoping to avoid re-inventing the wheel and
time/labor of manually creating vector lines along the known railway
corridors, for a data set that already exists on somebody's desktop...
My understanding is that nobody has a 2nd diverse fiber route north of
the great lakes from Winnipeg to Toronto. Every provider makes use of
a fiber route south of the great lakes thru the US in order to provide
diversity.
The following map shows that the CN rail and CP Rail lines across over
each other at multiple times from Winnipeg to Toronto.
http://www.cpr.ca/en/choose-rail-site/Documents/cp-network-map-2016.pdf
My understanding is that nobody has a 2nd diverse fiber route north of
the great lakes from Winnipeg to Toronto. Every provider makes use of
a fiber route south of the great lakes thru the US in order to provide
diversity.
But if provider 1 has its 1 fibre on the CN line and provider 2 has its
1 fibre along CP line (or road), then you can get diversity by getting
bandwidth from both.
The following map shows that the CN rail and CP Rail lines across over
each other at multiple times from Winnipeg to Toronto.
At Rennie MB, the CN line has a bridge over the CP line. Between Sudbury
and Toronto, you may have to live with the crossings. But I suspect they
are bridged too (with some interchange points near Sudbury).
Ideally, there would be some link leftover from when there were tracks
between Ottawa and Sudbury. Tracks remain between Mattawa and Sudbury.
(Ottawa-Mattawa removed circa 2012). Bell Canada still wants to serve
those areas even if tracks no longer present.
Note: road has interesting side effects. A new bridge on highway 17
"broke" when it got too cold: the stay cables on suspension bridge
contracted and ended up lifting bridge deck by about 1m above ground
level. So any fibre conduits would have been severed as it crossed from
ground to bridge.
Actually, it wasn't an entire meter - photos say an entire *foot* perhaps. Stupid
metric-imperial conversion error 
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/nipigon-bridge-transcanada-update-1.3398207
"But if provider 1 has its 1 fibre on the CN line and provider 2 has its
1 fibre along CP line (or road), then you can get diversity by getting
bandwidth from both."
That's not diversity. That's just a matter of time before the same backhoe
catches them both.
It depends on how the lines "cross" each other. Two tunnels and you
have physical seperation. Crossing at the same level then you don't.
Mark
JF, c¹est bon ça!
This is good point JF, according to
http://www.acwr.com/economic-development/rail-maps/canadian-national we
seem to have a single rail on top of Lac Superior. Other than that, it¹s
diverse. Is there diverse train routes and associated fibre routes? Which
provider follow CP and CN??
Jacques
On 2017-10-11, 3:04 PM, "NANOG on behalf of Jean-Francois Mezei"
JF, c¹est bon ça!
This is good point JF, according to
Canadian National Railway Map - ACW Railway Company we
seem to have a single rail on top of Lac Superior.
Both CN and CP (still) have their own tracks. CP along shore of Lake
Superior, CN further north.
a more accurate map of CN where they have track rights or own tracks:
http://cnebusiness.geomapguide.ca/?MAP=WL
The black lines indicate other railways (such as CP and short lines)
As CP went on a "anthing but be a railway" policy between early 1980s
and a shoreholder revolt a couple years ago, not sure how many telecoms
would have wanted their fibre along CP tracks that CP might tear up.
(CP had requested permission to shut Thunder Bay to Sudbury in the 1980s
- it was refused).
It isn't clear to me what happens to fibre when a railway abandons and
removes tracks. For instance, Rigaud to Ottawa on CP. Ottawa to Sudbury
was sold to short line, and Ottawa-Mattawa tracks removed in 2012. CN
had long ago removed its Ottawa-Sudbury tracks.
So, from Ottawa to Winnipeg, unless a carrier follows rural road 17 (the
trans canada in Ontario) from Ottawa to Sudbury, you are essentially
stuck with the one track out of Ottawa to Smith Falls. There, the CP to
Belleville, or continue to Brockville and CN to Belleville.
Belleville to Toronto, the CP and CN tracks basically follow each other,
sometimes distant enough to have separate crossings, often share same
rail crossing barriers.
And from Pickering to downtown, it's basically the Metrolinx tracks (Go
Train) or go around on freight lines and then down to downtown (and
follow same route up towards Sudbury).
From a "diversity" point of view, I guess you have to look at frequency
of backhoe events on railway right of way. Since railways also have
their own signaling fibre in the conduits, I suspect they have very few
"oops, forgot there were conduits below tracks" events.
Also, whether train derailments often affect fibre under tracks. CN had
a few derailments along its Sudbury-Winnipeg line last year and there
were no news of major telecom disruptions. Is it because of carriers
having diversity in routes or because the fibre under tracks is rarely
affected by derailments?
So would having carrier-A and carrier-B burried same tracks be
considered dangerous ? (along a road, I suspect the backhoe risks are
higher since individual home owners have driveways to road and could use
a backhoe without calling anyone). But along tracks, farmers would not
use backhoes or other equipment over track ballast.
Also: there is a big difference between a highway like the 401/417 and a
road line the 17. For major highways, any upgrades/construction will
involve the govt informing the carriers who would have burried cables
along highway.
But along rural roads like the 17, municipalities often are in charge of
a strech of highway, and individual homeowners or businesses have their
driveway to the road and may not call to locate cables before having fun
with their backhoe.
The fibre optic cables are buried within the RoW, not on private property.
It is against the law to dig without having utilities located first.
If it's against the law, then it should never happen, right?
Also, I know a lot of people getting their own easements and not using the RoW. You can't be forced into anything except by eminent domain.
There are four facts to be aware of here.
1. Locators are not 100% especially when it comes to fiber. Databases do not always get updated and maps can have errors. They can be difficult to locate if they are not mapped because there is very little detectable metal in them. I have personally been on projects where we hit live power line stubs, gas lines, and comm cables even after reviewing the maps and have locators out. Records sometimes suck. The problem has gotten worse with the explosion in the number of carriers, you only used to have to worry about Bell, power, and gas. Now you have tons of fiber carriers, telecoms, and cable TV all updating (or failing to update) records.
2. Not everything is in public RoW, many fiber carriers have cut their own deals with landowners, railroads, etc.
3. Installers take short cuts. For example, your map and locator might show a very nice 90 degree corner but often if directionally drilled it is going to be a large sweeping turn that may very well leave the RoW. One side effect of directional boring is that no one really notices if they cut out of the RoW since there is no above ground evidence to cause a complaint. Installations going to a house or business outside the RoW may show a nice straight line on the map but if that boring rig hits a rock you better believe they will steer around it.
4. Stuff gets moved without proper coordination. Guys that put in hard lines (pipelines, sewer, water, gas mains) will often move a cable that gets in their way as long as it has enough slack to do so. They know that the coordination takes time that delays their jobs so the reality is if they have to move a cable over four or five feet, they are going to just do it.
Steven Naslund
Chicago IL
I remember years ago in New Zealand there was buried fibre along the railway running north-south in the North Island that was not generally anybody's first choice of glass when trying to connect sites in Auckland and Wellington. The problem I heard described (from memory, long time ago, I am old) was that the natural vibration of the ground due to trains on rails had the effect over time of pushing conduit down the embankment away from the track, leading to fibre breaks with no corresponding obvious cause (no digging).
You could bounce signals down the copper in the conduit from either side to try and figure out where the break was, but once on site you still had to find the fibre which was usually not anywhere close to where the map said it was buried.
Joe
I believe when I've looked into it before, UP required your utility to be at the far outside edge of their ROW, so not really close to the track.