Challenges as Cityfibre Moot Using BT Cable Ducts in Southend-on-Sea

Industry sources have reportedly revealed that Cityfibre are working with BT (Openreach) to test a major deployment of Ofcom’s newly proposed Duct and Pole Access (DPA) solution, which could help ISPs to build alternative networks by giving them better access to BT’s cable ducts and poles.

Last month Cityfibre announced that they’d won a new 10-year and £3.24 million contract to build a 50km long Dark Fibre network around Southend-on-Sea (Essex, England) that will provide ultrafast broadband / Ethernet services to 120 key public sector sites and local businesses (more details).

However a report in The Telegraph claims that Cityfibre will also attempt to use Ofcom’s newly proposed regulatory fix (Duct and Pole Access), which essentially nudges BT to give rival operator’s more access to harness their existing network of underground cable ducts and overground poles. Check out our full summary of the DPA solution.

Ofcom’s approach attempts to put right some of the problems with the previous Physical Infrastructure Access (PIA) solution that tried to do the same sort of thing, although PIA was often hobbled by awkward costs, tedious administrative processes and limitations on its use (e.g. no rural backhaul or big business connectivity).

As it stands Ofcom are still working out the details and the Cityfibre test will play a part in that, although the new report also indicates that there might be problems ahead. “There’s not enough capacity to build a fibre to the home network in some of these ducts [and] some of BT’s poles are full too,” said the newspapers source.

Ofcom’s Strategic Review proposal suggested that there could be “sufficient duct space … available in the UK to support [the DPA] model of competition” and it pointed to a 2010 survey, which found that 63% of the 90mm duct ends surveyed and 97% of the 50mm duct ends surveyed (between the street cabinet and the premise) had at least 42% of unoccupied space. But that was 6 years ago and a lot has changed (e.g. BT have already blown a lot of new fibre through existing ducts), although many new ducts have also been built.

On the other hand BT has already warned that this will “not all translate into useable duct space” and indeed we’ve seen plenty of issues with blocked or simply poor quality cable ducts crop up as part of the Broadband Delivery UK project, which in some cases has prevented an upgrade due to the high cost of repair or challenges with access.

Never the less Ofcom believes that it still “provides a basis for cautious optimism” and Cityfibre has already made no secret of their desire to use the DPA solution, but the practical problems of doing this may yet hamper its impact. BT are now said to be surveying their Southend-on-Sea ducts in order to get a better picture of the area.

Meanwhile Ofcom are still keeping the option of splitting Openreach from BT’s control on the table, albeit only if they are unable to reach a voluntary agreement with BT over their alternative remedies.