Here in Maine, after seeing no strong proposals were being put forward by
others, we went after American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds to
address a major lack of middle-mile infrastructure in the state.
Verizon had stopped making new investments in Maine for nearly 10 years
before pulling out and dumping a very old, very high maintenance copper
plant on Fairpoint. It was nearly criminal. Even worse, the Fairpoint
business plan was to continue to make large investments in copper ignoring
the realities that fiber is the only way to reach areas in a cost effective
way with such low population density.
So the University of Maine System and Great Works Internet prepared a
proposal for a public-private partnership to build out high capacity,
diverse, middle-mile infrastructure in Maine; and instead of the University
of Maine System or Great Works Internet managing it, we set it up so that a
new independent private company would be created to manage the
infrastructure and would be regulated as a public utility by the state;
very similar to the power company model. The result is that Maine now has
a new public utility classification of "dark fiber provider", and a company
building out that fiber.
It's called Maine Fiber Company:
http://www.mainefiberco.com/
The way Maine Fiber Company was setup was key. They're forbidden to offer
lit services; so they're a dark fiber only provider. They're require to
provide open access to the fiber at a fair and published rate to anyone
interested. Since the build was subsidized in part by Recovery Act funds,
the rates are low enough to encourage new services in the state.
One of the big problems in a state like Maine, and probably the majority of
the US, is that companies like Fairpoint and Time Warner Cable (the two
providers in Maine) end up building out redundant infrastructure at great
cost. Not redundant as in diverse, mind you, but literally running fiber
on the same utility polls, taking the same path, and both going down when
hit by a truck. Because areas of the state are very low population, they
often can't justify building a diverse path, so historically, one accident
could, and often has, taken out services for entire counties.
For the last few years MFC has been working to build out the high capacity
fiber rings described, and this summer we're finally at a point where
people can begin making use of MFC infrastructure.
For us, it means expanding our R&E network, MaineREN, to interconnect the
public universities in Maine. But for other service providers like Great
Works Internet, it means being able to survive as Fairpoint tries to push
out their competitors:
See the following link for that story "Fairpoint Bankruptcy Exacerbates
Circuit War":
http://www.pressherald.com/archive/fairpoint-bankruptcy-exacerbates-circuit-war_2009-11-12.html
I think the model setup in Maine is something really powerful. It will
drive down the price of delivering broadband significantly; it will open up
and promote competition so that consumers aren't stuck paying premium rates
for 20th century services, and it will provide much needed redundancy of
services. It also helps the bigger companies like Fairpoint and Time
Warner Cable if they're willing to make use of it (to
my recollection Fairpoint decided to not even bid for the build out; that's
how opposed they were to it)
Personally, I think this is a model that might be useful to replicate at a
municipal level as well: Dark fiber to the home as a public utility;
service provider of your choice to light it up. I think we're a few years
away from seeing that kind of effort, though, but after a few years of
seeing the effect that Maine Fiber Company will have on the state, there
might be people open to the idea.
For now, I'm thankful to have the middle-mile taken care of.
I know a few other states decided to go after recovery act money for
broadband; does anyone know if something like the Maine model is being
replicated anywhere else in the US?