6 ms·

Why can't they just leave the infrastructure there in case somebody else decides to utilize it at some point?

kkarakk 7y ago
it's not "infrastructure" it's small cuts in the road(which is the reason why it failed). if they left it as is, it would probably turn into potholes that the city would have to fix
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
jonathankoren 7y ago
Because their infrastructure failed. Nature is forcing it out of its tiny trench and on to the roads, where it’s getting cut by cars. You can see the state of it in the link below. https://gizmodo.com/when-google-fiber-abandons-your-city-as-a-failed-experi-1833244198 https://gizmodo.com/when-google-fiber-abandons-your-city-as-...
- chrisseaton 7y ago
  Wow that's not what you expect when you think of Google engineering. In some other photos the actual fibre is now above the ground.
  - WorldMaker 7y ago
    It's the new picture of Google Engineering for at least some of us now. It's very hard to trust a company that failed this spectacularly, doing something so clearly very dumb.
    - noxxten 7y ago
      This. I was thrilled when Google announced Louisville would be getting service. Louisville is a relatively tiny city in comparison, and not long after the announcement both AT&T and Time Warner/Spectrum lowered prices AND raised speeds. AT&T dramatically increased their own fiber rollout too. When I first started hearing about the micro/nano trenching issues... I was really shocked Google would be so careless and downright stupid. After being allowed to use the poles, they chose to trench? In a city that not only regularly floods, but has near-constant road construction? Never mind how little quality control they imposed on the contractors to trench the lines, half of them appear to have been laid on the ground and half-ass covered with some dirt. It's an absolute disgrace of civil engineering, particularly from such a large and engineering-centric company. Also, just as an aside, now that Google has completely abandoned Louisville and we're left with Spectrum and AT&T in most areas... Both have raised prices, and it appears that AT&T is starting to slow it's fiber rollout in some areas.
      - WorldMaker 7y ago
        As I pointed out in another thread, Louisville is in the middle of Karst country and hugely restricts underground work for very good reasons due to all the limestone underneath the city. The city was very clear they had to use the utility poles because more than a century of civil engineering backs up the city's reliance on its utility poles. Google knew trenching wasn't a viable solution in the city and they did it anyway.
microcolonel 7y ago
There turned out to be mechanical issues with their shallow trench design in Louisville's climate, and with their road conditions (ploughs, salt, grit, etc.), and once they found that out they didn't think they could improve the design sufficiently to function in Louisville while remaining solvent. They found this out pretty early in their deployment, they were only a couple per cent into the deployment before it became a serious issue.
- nulbyte 7y ago
  To my mind, they found out pretty late. If they didn't take our climate into account during the design process, they failed before they began. It's not like these were unusual weather occurrences. Further, they lobbied metro council to pass one-touch make ready and incur the expenses of a lawsuit from AT&T. And how many poles did they end up using? None, because they gave up and went home.

it's not "infrastructure" it's small cuts in the road(which is the reason why it failed). if they left it as is, it would probably turn into potholes that the city would have to fix

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

jonathankoren 7y ago

Because their infrastructure failed. Nature is forcing it out of its tiny trench and on to the roads, where it’s getting cut by cars. You can see the state of it in the link below. https://gizmodo.com/when-google-fiber-abandons-your-city-as-a-failed-experi-1833244198 https://gizmodo.com/when-google-fiber-abandons-your-city-as-...

chrisseaton 7y ago
Wow that's not what you expect when you think of Google engineering. In some other photos the actual fibre is now above the ground.
- WorldMaker 7y ago
  It's the new picture of Google Engineering for at least some of us now. It's very hard to trust a company that failed this spectacularly, doing something so clearly very dumb.
  - noxxten 7y ago
    This. I was thrilled when Google announced Louisville would be getting service. Louisville is a relatively tiny city in comparison, and not long after the announcement both AT&T and Time Warner/Spectrum lowered prices AND raised speeds. AT&T dramatically increased their own fiber rollout too. When I first started hearing about the micro/nano trenching issues... I was really shocked Google would be so careless and downright stupid. After being allowed to use the poles, they chose to trench? In a city that not only regularly floods, but has near-constant road construction? Never mind how little quality control they imposed on the contractors to trench the lines, half of them appear to have been laid on the ground and half-ass covered with some dirt. It's an absolute disgrace of civil engineering, particularly from such a large and engineering-centric company. Also, just as an aside, now that Google has completely abandoned Louisville and we're left with Spectrum and AT&T in most areas... Both have raised prices, and it appears that AT&T is starting to slow it's fiber rollout in some areas.
    - WorldMaker 7y ago
      As I pointed out in another thread, Louisville is in the middle of Karst country and hugely restricts underground work for very good reasons due to all the limestone underneath the city. The city was very clear they had to use the utility poles because more than a century of civil engineering backs up the city's reliance on its utility poles. Google knew trenching wasn't a viable solution in the city and they did it anyway.

microcolonel 7y ago

There turned out to be mechanical issues with their shallow trench design in Louisville's climate, and with their road conditions (ploughs, salt, grit, etc.), and once they found that out they didn't think they could improve the design sufficiently to function in Louisville while remaining solvent. They found this out pretty early in their deployment, they were only a couple per cent into the deployment before it became a serious issue.

nulbyte 7y ago
To my mind, they found out pretty late. If they didn't take our climate into account during the design process, they failed before they began. It's not like these were unusual weather occurrences. Further, they lobbied metro council to pass one-touch make ready and incur the expenses of a lawsuit from AT&T. And how many poles did they end up using? None, because they gave up and went home.