As for expanding the fiber ring, Stanford Research Park is one significant user, for instance the new Facebook facility there is having installed a direct link to the ring; are such installations being worked into the fiber ring build-out plans for community use?

-john mark agosta

The impression gained from a range of Palo Alto neighbors and friends of various ages and interests is that Fiber to the Premises (FTTP) is eagerly awaited in this community. Having this project as a priority for the City Council, especially in these tough financial times, is strongly endorsed. Palo Alto Online's following this story closely is appreciated.

I would see the fiber optic as an addition to our utilities and suggest that the 32 million surplus be applied to this project.
It does not seem like we should be asking for federal stimulus money for this project. Palo Alto has had ample time and one million per year income from this project.l there is no reason to be asking for a handout for it.

I am getting flyers from AT&T that imply that they have FTTP in some areas of Palo Alto already. The services they claim to provide seem like they would require FTTP in order to work adequately and seem a step beyond what you can get with either DSL or Cable.

Does anyone know any details about the AT&T Uverse? Is it Fiber?
If so, the city will be reinventing the wheel in a repeat of the Cable Coop fiasco.

Well, we just blew a wad of cash doing a PC (bs) appeasment 'audit' of the police dept. Sure had the money for that!

I would hope that the system would lease access to all the conventional wired service companies.

The City Charter is very specific about what the $32 Million surplus may be spent on and it definitely does not include FTTP.

Has anyone in the City or private industry confirmed that all residents want this service? Several of my older neighbors said they did not need it and would not subscribe - especially if it added to their monthly utility bill.

Since the City is supposed to have >20% of the residents over 60, this is a significant base.

I hope they don't follow Alameda's failure with telecom and lose millions trying to compete with Comcast who offered discounted "Alameda-only" rates to under cut Alameda's pricing:

Web Link

Palo Alto's dark fiber (for business customers) continues to make money for the utility and the City's general fund.

jerryL, In Palo Alto, AT&T's U-Verse is FTTN (fiber to the neighborhood and then copper to the premises), not FTTP. Raw bandwidth is limited to about 25 Mb/s downsteam and much less upstream. AT&T's Internet service products range from 1.5 Mb/s to 18 Mb/s downstream and from 1 Mb/s to 1.5 Mb/s upstream. However, the city's FTTP would have a raw bandwidth of 100 Mb/s symmetric (i.e., both upstream and downstream) -- or 1 Gb/s for power users. What specific products are offered would be up to the retail service providers, but as an example, XMission, a retail service provider on the UTOPIA municipal FTTP network in Utah offers residential Internet service at 15 Mb/s symmetric for $40/mo and 50 Mb/s symmetric for $60/mo.

According to state law, AT&T can "cherrypick" which parts of town it wants to serve. I haven't been receiving U-Verse flyers.

A friend told me that AT&T said he could upgrade from his current DSL service to a U-Verse Internet service for only $5/mo more than he's paying now, but only if he also subscribed to a $70/mo TV service, which he didn't want.

In short, the city's FTTP network would be much better than U-Verse.

Walter_E_Wallis, "Conventional wired service companies" like AT&T and Comcast would be eligible to be retail service providers on the city's FTTP network, on the same terms as all other retail service providers, assuming they were qualified. AT&T was a retail service provider on UTOPIA's municipal FTTP network; but then AT&T was acquired by SBC, and maybe SBC didn't like the message it sent.

Just, please, no city content control.

bob, In 2002, the city did a survey of a representative demographic sample of Palo Altans. About a thousand people replied. The city found that there was enough interest in citywide FTTH that it would more than pay for itself.

People who subscribe to FTTH service would pay the retail service provider (not the utility). So FTTH wouldn't make anyone's utility bill go up.

I'm over 60, and I want service.

Yeah, good luck with that Walter. Oh well, who knows, maybe the City isn't as 'Draconian' as this publication.

Does Mountain View still have free on line access?

"Palo Alto's dark fiber (for business customers) continues to make money for the utility and the City's general fund."

Another example of the rampant techno-illiteracy in this egregiously self-styled hub of alleged technological sophisticaion. Look: Dark fiber is called dark because it carries no light. Light is what carries the information payload that makes the money. No light, no money. Ergo, dark fiber makes no money.

This example illustrates why any FTTP service must be installed and operated by real techno-sophisticates, not by the technotyros who keep pushing an even less sophisticated city government to do it. If FTTP had money-making potential, knowledgeable commercial operators would be clamoring to provide FTTP. Their silence speaks volumes. The city would be wise to listen to it.

"If FTTP had money-making potential, knowledgeable commercial operators would be clamoring to provide FTTP. Their silence speaks volumes. The city would be wise to listen to it."

Wise counsel.

It's prudent for the City to encourage competition in the private marketplace; City-run or City-funded FTTP seems unwise here.

The FTTP supporters are merely one of the many special interest groups that want the taxpayers to fund their expensive pursuits. Like the airport supporters, they want subsidies from the government for something that the private sector cannot find a profit opportunity in. (In the case of the airport, even the [county] government cannot find a profit opportunity.)

This does not prevent the special interest pleaders from coming up with all sorts of specious arguments about how the wise leaders of Palo Alto government will operate their favored enterprise at a profit when greedy businessmen cannot.

Despite what Hoel and others write, every other city that's tried to operate a fiber business has failed miserably in financial terms. (Do a search on this forum going back several years for the 'debate'.)

Palo Alto isn't so special that we'll turn dark fiber into strands of gold where everyone else has failed.

Let Mr. Hoel and others like him pay their own way for fast internet service. T-1 lines are coming down in price all the time. But leave us taxpayers, who have MANY bigger fish to fry for real municipal needs, in peace.