Re: New home builders without wires

[Sean Donelan <sean () donelan com>]

On Thu, 19 Dec 2024, Karl Auer wrote:
> A friend was involved in a development project in a regional town. They
> specified conduits everywhere. When the network people showed up at
> some random later date, they mostly just had to pull stuff through
> existing conduits. Not sure of the details beyond that, but he reckoned
> it cost a lot less that doing it all later.

I'm not a real estate developer. I do not understand the reasoning.

Its not a technical problem, its a business problem.  The business 
incentives are messed up.  One builder told me their margin on new houses 
is about 15%. They try to optimize out any costs not required.  Spending 
money, so communication companies can save money later doesn't pay the 
developer's bills now.

Some states have "dig once" rules requiring spare conduit or coordinated 
scheduling by utlities.  But even "dig once" rules only apply to public 
roads, not private residential roads. Meanwhile wireless is free, from 
the developer's point of view.

I know, folks outside the United States are shaking their heads. 
Other countries have very detailed requirements for public infrastructure 
serving new construction, including broadband access.

> > Cable  134.4 million households (82%)
> > DSL    7 million households (4%)
> > Fiber  74.9 million households(46%)
> > Fixed wireless 77.3 million households (47%)
> > Satellite 162.8 million households (99%)
>
> What are the percentages?

Percentage of service addresses in USA ("passed" or "served") by 
each type of broadband technology, according to FCC data -- about 163 
million address total.

There are about 210 million addresses in the USA (including institutional, 
alias and virtual addresses)
US Census count of housing units -- 147 M
USPS count of delivery addresses -- 154 M residential, 12.6 M commercial