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On the other hand, municipalities generally run water and sewage services without complaints; incompetence and corruption in that department are so rare that th

On the other hand, municipalities generally run water and sewage services without complaints; incompetence and corruption in that department are so rare that they are news. You can privatize bus or trash service and hand the concession to someone else should the incumbent be too awful at their job, but things like water, sewage and data are natural monopolies, and for these different rules apply. The sad thing is that we know how regulated utilities ought to be run, but we choose not to. Hence Comcast and the Enron-sponsored electricity shenanigans in CA.

bennylope 11y ago
> municipalities generally run water and sewage services without complaints I'd largely agree with this from my own experience. The caveat here in comparing water & sewage to internet service is that water and sewage service - at least what we experience as end users - hasn't changed much over the years. Municipal governments are good at managing that type of service. I'm happy with the same water and sewage service that I had 15 years ago. Not sure I'd like the same Internet service. And I'm not so sure I'd trust my city to keep such a service up to date.
- michaelt 11y ago
  I'm not so sure I'd trust my city to keep such a service up to date. If the private sector is doing a great job at keeping your internet connection up to date, I'm glad for you! Unfortunately some Americans don't seem very happy with the level of service the market is providing [1] - IMHO if people are attending meetings and voting in favour of municipal broadband, it indicates the private sector isn't doing a very good job of keeping services up to date either! [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2ei1qj/after_an_internship_at_comcast/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2ei1qj/after_an_inter...
- baddox 11y ago
  Indeed, imagine if municipalities had needed to increase their sewage "bandwidth" per customer tenfold over the last decade.
  - HarryHirsch 11y ago
    There was a fairly heady construction boom in the last decade, let me remind you of that. That said, everyone seems to have a beef with Comcast, while the complaints about the Vermont muni ISPs and the only muni ISP in North Carolina (http://www.greenlightnc.com/ http://www.greenlightnc.com/) are muted.
  - kalleboo 11y ago
    Municipalities everywhere have had to deal with increased water usage and yes, sewage. I was just reading a news article from my former hometown about the original choices and changes of water sources and the build-up and upgrading of water towers as the town grew. Back in the early 1900's, water infrastructure WAS high-tech.
- cowsandmilk 11y ago
  Water and sewage have changed a lot over the years. Sure, you maybe can ignore it, but most cities regularly have to expand capacity and change technologies. The type of waste going down the toilet has changed tremendously during the 20th century. As a couple of examples, pharmaceuticals and tampons frequently go down the toilet now (even if people are told not to flush them). Additionally, acceptance of dumping raw sewage or overflows into waterways has hugely changed. I know many people who would roll up their windows when driving over the Potomac in DC. In Boston, the Harbor was absolutely atrocious and smelled for decades. Together, these two factors have led to large amounts of research into sewage treatment, new technologies, and upgrades nationwide. Just because you apparently are ignorant of them doesn't mean they haven't been occurring. The pace over the last 15 years has probably been slower, but if you look at the 1970's and 1980's following the passage of the Clean Water Act, upgrades of these systems were occurring on as large a scale as ISP upgrades. In fact, they probably were larger in total cost.
  - bennylope 11y ago
    > Together, these two factors have led to large amounts of research into sewage treatment, new technologies, and upgrades nationwide. Just because you apparently are ignorant of them doesn't mean they haven't been occurring. While admittedly ignorant of the specific changes in water and sewage provision, I never suggested they weren't occurring - I said the experience for an end user hasn't really changed much. Even if the water quality has increased tenfold and a city's demand trebled in a decade, we're still pulling water from the tap the same way we were before, and our usage year over year doesn't change that much (on a household basis). My household needs and expectations for water service don't seem any different than 15 years ago, whereas my household needs and expectations for internet service are radically different. Governments do 'big' better than 'fast'.
- kalleboo 11y ago
  You don't want the municipality to provide you with Internet service. You want them to provide you with fiber service. Then they let you pick a private actor to provide you with services over that fiber (internet, voip, iptv, etc). That's how the system was where I lived in Sweden and it worked great. The fiber network was built and maintained by the local municipality-owned power company who knows a thing or two about running grids (and already had conduits running all over the place)
  - bennylope 11y ago
    Well I'm sorry, but that sounds altogether far too sensible.
ams6110 11y ago
My town fired the city chemist because he wasn't actually doing the water quality tests. And I view sanitary drinking water as a public health obligation. Internet service isn't even in that ballpark for me. It's a convenience, and one that people should be able to choose to pay for, or not.
- HarryHirsch 11y ago
  The alternative view is that nowadays the internet is part of the infrastructure, and individuals don't get to opt out. Same thing as with the municipal pool.
- ericd 11y ago
  It started as a luxury, but it's starting to become a requirement, and you can start doing more interesting things in government once you're able to assume that everyone has access to it (just as government was able to do more interesting things once it could assume that the postal system reached everyone).
- refurb 11y ago
  There were a bunch of folks who died in Ontario, Canada when the water service failed to adequately treat the water. It was a patronage appointment and they (two brothers) knew nothing about water quality. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak
rayiner 11y ago
The American Association of Civil Engineers estimates a multi-trillion backlog in municipal infrastructure investment. Sewage and water systems around the country are more likely to be out of compliance with water quality or environmental standards that not. They have lead pipes and dump raw sewage into rivers when it rains. They have no money to come into compliance because it's politically untenable to raise water and sewer rates.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- nitrogen 11y ago
  The existence of bad sewers bears no relevance to the likelihood of having good fiber services.

bennylope 11y ago

> municipalities generally run water and sewage services without complaints I'd largely agree with this from my own experience. The caveat here in comparing water & sewage to internet service is that water and sewage service - at least what we experience as end users - hasn't changed much over the years. Municipal governments are good at managing that type of service. I'm happy with the same water and sewage service that I had 15 years ago. Not sure I'd like the same Internet service. And I'm not so sure I'd trust my city to keep such a service up to date.

michaelt 11y ago
I'm not so sure I'd trust my city to keep such a service up to date. If the private sector is doing a great job at keeping your internet connection up to date, I'm glad for you! Unfortunately some Americans don't seem very happy with the level of service the market is providing [1] - IMHO if people are attending meetings and voting in favour of municipal broadband, it indicates the private sector isn't doing a very good job of keeping services up to date either! [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2ei1qj/after_an_internship_at_comcast/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2ei1qj/after_an_inter...
baddox 11y ago
Indeed, imagine if municipalities had needed to increase their sewage "bandwidth" per customer tenfold over the last decade.
- HarryHirsch 11y ago
  There was a fairly heady construction boom in the last decade, let me remind you of that. That said, everyone seems to have a beef with Comcast, while the complaints about the Vermont muni ISPs and the only muni ISP in North Carolina (http://www.greenlightnc.com/ http://www.greenlightnc.com/) are muted.
- kalleboo 11y ago
  Municipalities everywhere have had to deal with increased water usage and yes, sewage. I was just reading a news article from my former hometown about the original choices and changes of water sources and the build-up and upgrading of water towers as the town grew. Back in the early 1900's, water infrastructure WAS high-tech.
cowsandmilk 11y ago
Water and sewage have changed a lot over the years. Sure, you maybe can ignore it, but most cities regularly have to expand capacity and change technologies. The type of waste going down the toilet has changed tremendously during the 20th century. As a couple of examples, pharmaceuticals and tampons frequently go down the toilet now (even if people are told not to flush them). Additionally, acceptance of dumping raw sewage or overflows into waterways has hugely changed. I know many people who would roll up their windows when driving over the Potomac in DC. In Boston, the Harbor was absolutely atrocious and smelled for decades. Together, these two factors have led to large amounts of research into sewage treatment, new technologies, and upgrades nationwide. Just because you apparently are ignorant of them doesn't mean they haven't been occurring. The pace over the last 15 years has probably been slower, but if you look at the 1970's and 1980's following the passage of the Clean Water Act, upgrades of these systems were occurring on as large a scale as ISP upgrades. In fact, they probably were larger in total cost.
- bennylope 11y ago
  > Together, these two factors have led to large amounts of research into sewage treatment, new technologies, and upgrades nationwide. Just because you apparently are ignorant of them doesn't mean they haven't been occurring. While admittedly ignorant of the specific changes in water and sewage provision, I never suggested they weren't occurring - I said the experience for an end user hasn't really changed much. Even if the water quality has increased tenfold and a city's demand trebled in a decade, we're still pulling water from the tap the same way we were before, and our usage year over year doesn't change that much (on a household basis). My household needs and expectations for water service don't seem any different than 15 years ago, whereas my household needs and expectations for internet service are radically different. Governments do 'big' better than 'fast'.
kalleboo 11y ago
You don't want the municipality to provide you with Internet service. You want them to provide you with fiber service. Then they let you pick a private actor to provide you with services over that fiber (internet, voip, iptv, etc). That's how the system was where I lived in Sweden and it worked great. The fiber network was built and maintained by the local municipality-owned power company who knows a thing or two about running grids (and already had conduits running all over the place)
- bennylope 11y ago
  Well I'm sorry, but that sounds altogether far too sensible.

ams6110 11y ago

My town fired the city chemist because he wasn't actually doing the water quality tests. And I view sanitary drinking water as a public health obligation. Internet service isn't even in that ballpark for me. It's a convenience, and one that people should be able to choose to pay for, or not.

HarryHirsch 11y ago
The alternative view is that nowadays the internet is part of the infrastructure, and individuals don't get to opt out. Same thing as with the municipal pool.
ericd 11y ago
It started as a luxury, but it's starting to become a requirement, and you can start doing more interesting things in government once you're able to assume that everyone has access to it (just as government was able to do more interesting things once it could assume that the postal system reached everyone).
refurb 11y ago
There were a bunch of folks who died in Ontario, Canada when the water service failed to adequately treat the water. It was a patronage appointment and they (two brothers) knew nothing about water quality. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak

rayiner 11y ago

The American Association of Civil Engineers estimates a multi-trillion backlog in municipal infrastructure investment. Sewage and water systems around the country are more likely to be out of compliance with water quality or environmental standards that not. They have lead pipes and dump raw sewage into rivers when it rains. They have no money to come into compliance because it's politically untenable to raise water and sewer rates.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
nitrogen 11y ago
The existence of bad sewers bears no relevance to the likelihood of having good fiber services.