Slashdot Mirror
Fl. County Halts FTTP Until Installation Is Safer
celerityfm writes "Warning: Deploying Verizon's new Fiber To The Premises (FTTP, see previous) in YOUR neighborhood may involve geysers of raw sewage spewing onto your front yard or sinkholes opening and swallowing moving vehicles. Well, Hillsborough County, host to one of the first FTTP trial sites, has ordered Verizon to stop deployment of FTTP until they can figure out how to stop creating sinkholes that open up under minivans with children inside. No word on whether SBC is having similar problems with their fiber roll-out."
This takes incompetence to a whole new level. I mean, its just a cable. I've installed lots of local and wide area networks without hitting even one sewer line.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
"Verizon also is looking at other means, including using ground-penetrating radar and other technology, to locate lines before crews dig."
Don't they have maps to locate lines, sewers and such? Don't tell me they're digging blindly...
"County auditors examine the cause of each break and determine whether Verizon or water department officials are to blame. The responsible party is billed, said Rich Cummings, section manager for line maintenance for the water department."
It seem that Verizon will be paying the bill in the end anyway... of course, you can't pay for all the trouble it cause to citizens... can't they be careful?
Eureka Science News - automatically updated
The only reason this is news is beacuse it involves FTTP. ANd it's not even Verizon's fault, it's the subcontractors.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Maybe I'm missing the point here, but don't they have these problems with any kind of underground infrastructural deployments in certain areas? I thought this has more to do with geology than with contractor ineptitude.
Ok, hitting sewer lines is bad, but in theory, before any dig, the local utilites (including sanitation) would come and mark the ground so that this wouldn't happen. But sinkholes? Aren't those things opening up all over Florida all the time anyway? I thought it had to do with the geological makeup of the soil in the area and the lack of firm bedrock, more than bad digging. Not that digging wouldn't exacerbate the problem.
Seems to me the county wouldn't have much room to complain if they hadn't accurately marked underground lines before digging begins, as is usually the law (in every place i've lived anyway.) Also seems like if they did do this, then Verizon's contractors got some 'splainin to do.
This comment is fully compliant with RFC 527.
This is probably a great deal for the diggers; the cost of paying the county to fix the breaks is probably less than preventing them. Therfore, the only stick that the county has is to say STOP! No more digging until you clean up your act!
... to do their first deployment.
Slashdot's name? When my compiler sees
run the fiber through the water line itself.
While it's possible, it is a huge hassle. Fiber (and splitters, etc) rated for underwater use is much more expensive. And will you guarantee that nothing bad will leach out of the fiber into the drinking water for the house?
It would be far faster, it would be far cheaper than digging trenches,
I doubt it, but it's possible.
it would be far easier to pop a fitting inside the house to extract the fiber from the incoming pipe than digging an entire trench!
So, what about all the valves? Going to run your fiber through that? Or create a new leakage opportunity every time you take the fiber in & out of the pipe ? And the bend radius of water pipes can be very short, much less than fiber.
They have knowledge but they don't have wisdom.
Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black.
go ahead rely on "newfangled electronic devices"... I work on them everyday, and I know better.
You aren't nesscesarily a luddite if you want a technology to actually prove itself before you adopt it as your sole communications method.
Cell phones are great, but cell networks are built on a shoestring budget because they are considered as important as landline phones to the telcos. Fiber is less prone to interference, but more prone to hardware failure and power blackouts. Some times it pays to rely on simple things.
I enjoy using my GPS when I'm backpacking, but you can be guaranteed I have my compass and topo map too.
Essentially if I want to call 911, my phone HAD BETTER WORK!
Assuming you're not just being ironic (sorry, I don't speak Initialese), NO, they don't have to call the 800 number. They have maps. You know, those paper thingies with lines and symbols on them that let you figure out where the subway stops are and that kind of stuff? But the maps are wrong. This is because they are old, and apparently nobody bothered to update them as things were changed over the years. And, as someone else has pointed out, the water table in Florida is somewhere around your knees, so you have to bury everything at the same level. And it's not a good idea to install stuff above ground because of the weather--lots of cyclonic wind conditions and the like. So you either give the place back to the Seminole Indians, who had enough sense not to invent electricity, or you dig and hope you don't hit something.
Now the county keeps talking about using satellites and GPS, which gives you some insight into the state of THEIR neural network, so I have to conclude that the fault lies mainly with those same officials for not keeping the maps current.
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."
"This sounds to me like a complaint of a competitor desperately trying to stop progress."
Ummm, there have been over *200 incidents* in the past few months. During the dotcom days in Colorado when Qworst had their Big Yellow Cablefinders out for twelve hour days even on weekends the whole region didn't see that many breakages in the four years I was there. On a side note, when it did happen it was considered pretty entertaining that they were generally tearing through their own cables.
From the article (I know, I did RTFA and should be chastised for doing so) it sounds like the massive volumes of complaints to the city had a little more to do with this than any of Verizons' competitors.
this is getting old and so are you
blog
Untilities overhead is not the best idea. I'll give you an example: Raleigh, NC (where I live). There are lots of utilties strung up on poles. That's great, except when the weather gets bad (which isn't that often), it gets _bad_. We have a strong ice storm at least once a year, and that brings down lines... lots of lines. That means we don't have power or internet access for days. I'm the lucky one, though... int he city it's only a few days, in the outlying areas it can be a week.
No, underground utilties are better.
The problem here is the contractors that utilities use: the lowest bidder is never the best choice. The lowest bidder is usually one guy and his boring machine... if he hits some other utility line, he'll never be able to pay the fines. His company goes bankrupt and someone else (we taxpayers and/or ratepayers) have to foot the bill. Use someone competent, with decent insurance, and there won't be a problem.
Unfortunately it would be more accurate to say, " SUV's with an idiot in them".
I am amazed at the number of SUV's that only have 1 person in them. If you need a vehicle that big then that's fine. However, 95% of the population does not need an SUV. Unless you have more than 3 kids or haul things around there is no reason why you need an SUV. I guess those people have a lot of air to haul.