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http://westhawaiitoday.com/news/local-ne...dwide-flaw
"The subsidies are necessary, said Kailua-Kona resident Aaron Stene, a concerned technology user who has studied the island’s cable issues extensively, because the sparse populations in most areas off Hawaii’s beaten path don’t justify the capital expenditures required. Sandwich Isles Communications Inc. is an example of a company that relies on subsidies to install broadband on Hawaiian Home Lands, Stene noted.
“There isn’t the same return on investment here, because the population is so much smaller,” Stene said."
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In other words - we are the second world backwater that we are!
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On the mainland, the cable companies started running fiber mains about 5 years ago into rural areas. There was talk back then if this was worth the cost for the cable companies. Looking at the Oceanic cable here, it is all copper coming into Puna. Even if Puna is one of the faster growing areas on Hawaii island, it also has the highest percentage of people mostly off-grid and off the main roads. That makes running coax to individual houses more expensive and not economically feasible to run fiber mains into a rural area with a low population density and a high probability of large parts of the infrastructure being covered over with lava. Bottom line, it isn't worth it for Hawaii Telcom or Oceanic Time Warner to upgrade the few lines that are existing now.
"This island Hawaii on this island Earth"
*Japanese tourist on bus through Pahoa, "Is this still America?*
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Telcom's existing copper plant would easily provide high-speed internet if Telcom simply installed remote DSLAMs "closer to the edges".
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quote:
Originally posted by kalakoa
Telcom's existing copper plant would easily provide high-speed internet if Telcom simply installed remote DSLAMs "closer to the edges".
Hawaiian Telcom is DSL and that usually requires being within 3 miles of a switch or DSLAM. Those are a fairly big investment so Hawaiian Telcom isn't going to be motivated to do that. Don't know how far the DSL goes but it's in Beaches at 10mbps for basic, but they won't add new switches so the connection only becomes available as others cancel. Both Hawaiian Telcom and Oceanic Time Warner have no financial incentive to invest millions of infrastructure upgrades and expansions into lava zone 1 and lava zone 2 areas.
"This island Hawaii on this island Earth"
*Japanese tourist on bus through Pahoa, "Is this still America?*
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They may not have financial incentive, but as state regulated utilities/franchises, they have responsibility to serve all state residents. I don't blame the companies for avoiding unprofitable investment, they work for their shareholders. I blame state regulators in Honolulu for not enforcing build-out requirements that would ensure Puna and other rural areas have basic broadband coverage.
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Well, On the mainland! hahaha Had to throw that in there...
Really, tho, Comcast / Road runner is just putting up access points in weather tight boxes on the poles. No cables, No hookups, no problems.
One day maybe it will come to America, I mean Hawaii...
Kinda funny, I was looking at possibly buying a lot again in Orchidland. Sigh. It's just so remote. I mean, not remote, just no infrastructure. I think of living in the REAL world of having an AFFORDABLE high speed internet option. What do you get in Orchidland? I telephone (dial up).
Blah. I visited my old neighbor that gave up coconut wireless and went with satellite. 130 bucks a month. Ouch. What I'd probably also have to do as well. 1500 cash yearly to feel like you can connect to the real world. I guess it's one of the costs of living here.
We could all move to kansas city. Google Fiber
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"I blame state regulators in Honolulu for not enforcing build-out requirements that would ensure Puna and other rural areas have basic broadband coverage."
Are there actually "requirements" in Hawai'i that companies enlarge their infrastructure to serve rural areas? In the 1930's the Rural Electric Administration did this for electricity, as usual in the face of opposition that it interfered with private enterprise that, of course, was doing nothing.
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It's pretty amusing to see how the Oceanic cable is run. It was put in by Road Runner, and it looks like from the early days before the internet. Road Runner started pulling cable on the mainland in 1995 without even knowing about the internet, trying to deal with the shortage of phone lines for bbs'ing, back then.
The amusing part is the cable comes straight out of town, goes past Orchidland and HPP, straight with no branches all the way to Pahoa, where one branch goes down Kahakai and one branch goes through Pahoa village, 20mbps standard. There are reasons for this and Kalapana going from a tourist resort to lava fields really flattened infrastructure investment. It is easy to see there was all this upgrading going on with the road and the poles, right up to where the lava covers it up.
Cable is regulated but isn't a required service. People need to remember that almost everything in Hawaii is from private investment from the mainland. The government regulation is being back-fitted into this pre-existing infrastructure -- a plantation infrastructure. Every failed development in Puna originally thought they would be like resorts (in the 60's), not low-income family and senior citizen housing. There was one that was going to be a gated community and that is why Oceanic runs directly to there. Even with the people moving in, the population density is very low in south Puna so most infrastructure development will stay static for a long time. There is no profit incentive for business and the county is too poor to support a fiber PUD.
"This island Hawaii on this island Earth"
*Japanese tourist on bus through Pahoa, "Is this still America?*
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The population density of HPP is 760 people per square mile and is the highest population density on the island according to the 2010 census. Yet cable is still only available to about half the subdivision.
