Mike:
Excellent research. You've done an remarkable amount of research with diligence and admirable effort. Sorry I missed your posts on "Last Mile." Need to get back over there with the brain trust, but it takes a lot effort, such as the one you have expended on this issue, to keep up with those guys.
Anyway, the issue you've addressed, unbundling of packet switching at the RT, is precisely the discussion I had with the head loop design engineer of PacBell-South about 6-7 months ago. I had asked him that particular question, & I think I recall discussing the same in brief on the "Last Mile" thread. At the time, it was not clear to me whether the CLECs would have access to the RT since at the time their co-location rights were limited to the CO. I rationalized that even if they were granted access rights at the RT, they would have to install their own DLC/Remote DSLAM in order to provision their own flavor of DSL, concluding that SBC would unlikely spend the big bucks in installing RTs only to allot capacity to competitive provisioned services. I felt the strategy employed by SBC to be an effective end-run around the unbundling requirements at the CO.
Moreover, I felt any redundancy in the local loop would be bad policy since it would hinder the rollout of broadband services to the outer fringes of the PSTN, where a good portion of residential customers reside. Similar to FCC policy on the cable platform, it is a priority to get these service deployed. Competition can be addressed later.
The RTs SBC will be installing will be approximately 600 sq. ft. in size, essentially a small room loaded with a slew of racks. At some point, I believe, given the physical space, the FCC will impose co-location access to the copper at these RTs.
All in all, Mike, great work. I'm not only impressed with the work you do on this subject, but I am envious I'm not doing it myself. You do this full time? |
