Broadband expansion efforts in West Virginia face many hurdles: challenging topography, diffuse populations, and limiting economic factors. Annie Stroud, Broadband Program Director at Generation West Virginia, reported that one of the most significant issues is the pole attachment permit process.
Underground deployments are difficult in West Virginia, and a majority of broadband deployments in the state rely on telephone poles.
“The cost-effectiveness of that is really challenging,” said Stroud in a recent Fiber for Breakfast webinar. “We have mountainous, hilly terrain—a lot of rocks. There are some parts of the state where underground deployments make sense, but across the board, most of the fiber deployment has been aerial.”
According to Stroud, providers want to use existing poles when deploying fiber. For this to happen, the provider must submit an engineer-reviewed outline, which is then reviewed and returned to the provider with either an approval status or a set of required changes.
“With some of the funding, we’re already starting to see delayed timelines because of the pole-attachment process,” said Stroud. “This obviously is a big issue for managing grant deadlines and potentially losing access to time-sensitive grant funds.”
She reported that the most impactful effects of these delays are increased and unpredictable costs: permit submission costs, make-ready costs, and pole replacement and attachment costs.
Another issue is the remaining longevity of the existing pole infrastructure, which is aging and won’t last long.
“A lot of the poles have not been replaced in a really long time, or they were put out for telephone lines; they’re expensive to replace and maintain,” said Stroud. “We’ve been hearing complaints from providers that pole owners may be using some of this broadband funding to help them replace aging inventory.”
She reported that poorly executed requests can also cause delays.
“The owners, I think, don’t always have the urgency to address their own internal staffing capacity to actually review these permits that are coming in in these giant blocks,” she said.
Stroud reported that some steps have already been taken to tackle these permitting issues. The Public Service Commission of West Virginia issued a joint resolution streamlining the application process and has created a task force whose focus is to further optimize the permitting process. Additionally, West Virginia now has a list of approved contractors from the pole owners and will replicate some of the FCC’s methods for developing a full inventory on the state level.
Ultimately, Stroud hopes the efforts will compel West Virginians to pursue career opportunities within the state.
“We recognized very early on that the lack of connectivity throughout the state was one of the many barriers that were making it difficult for people to either move back to the state and work remotely or stay in the state and develop their own businesses and careers here,” said Stroud.
Besides its broadband efforts, Generations West Virginia organization has three other programs:
- Newforce One: a six-month data analytics training program
- The GWV Fellowship: a professional development networking opportunity
- Career Connector: a job board and resume bank
For related articles, visit the Broadband Topic Center.
For more information on high-speed transmission systems and suppliers, visit the Lightwave Buyer’s Guide.
To stay abreast of fiber network deployments, subscribe to Lightwave’s Service Providers and Datacom/Data Center newsletters.
Hayden Beeson
Hayden Beeson is a writer and editor with over seven years of experience in a variety of industries. Prior to joining Lightwave and Broadband Technology Report, he was the associate editor of Architectural SSL and LEDs Magazine.