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I was working at a Macy's store today that is undergoing renovations. They have sold off the fifth floor which originally contained Verizon's underground facilities and their PBX room. Yeah, that is a bit of an odd setup, but that's how it was.

Verizon brought in fiber and installed a rack with all kinds of power and electronic equipment on it. The customer had ordered one DS3 which came in over the fiber. Another DS3 was used to feed a rack of Adtran cards that are presumably there for various other DS1 circuits, etc. None were live.

They also brought in a brand-new 100 pair copper cable from the manhole out in the street. Ironically, about 15 of the pairs were being used for POTS lines.

I saw a similar situation last week where they brought in a brand-new 600 pair copper feed cable for a six-story office building. Of course, this was in addition to the usual racks of fiber stuff.

It doesn't appear that copper is dead in these parts as Verizon seems to be more than willing to bring it in on new installations just like the good old days. The only thing that I can't get my head around is those damned Krone blocks that they've started using.


Ed Vaughn, MBSWWYPBX
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In one of the COs I seem to visit monthly, there's a 4'x4'x4' plastic crate that the LEC technicians fill with scrap copper, mostly 1-pair aerial drop wires that are 30+ yrs old. They seem to fill that bin up to the top in a couple of months. Then it gets emptied, I assume taken to the scrap yard. Wash/rinse/repeat.

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My former employer...Level(3)...also saves scrap copper. The office I was based out of has 2 bins. One is used for low voltage cable and the other is for high voltage cable.

I can imagine that LECs are making frequent trips to the scrap yard due to the sheer volume of copper that they support.

When I saw Ed writing about the Macy's building, I envisioned it must be set up the same way as the one at Downtown Crossing here in Boston. The former Jordan Marsh flagship building has a store on the ground level and telecom condos on the upper ones.

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The closer you get to the rivers, the higher the Verizon cable heads are installed. I have a client 2 blocks away from the Allegheny river and their cable room is on the 11th floor. It's like that in 90% of the high rise buildings in Pittsburgh. The cables and fibers come from the manholes and go straight to the high floors before being broken out to individual demarcs. Here, that's not unusual. I guess a few hundred years of flooding does have some impact on cable planning. smile

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Originally Posted by Rcaman
The closer you get to the rivers, the higher the Verizon cable heads are installed. I have a client 2 blocks away from the Allegheny river and their cable room is on the 11th floor. It's like that in 90% of the high rise buildings in Pittsburgh. The cables and fibers come from the manholes and go straight to the high floors before being broken out to individual demarcs. Here, that's not unusual. I guess a few hundred years of flooding does have some impact on cable planning. smile

Rcaman

I wish they were as smart in my neck of the woods...we're STILL dealing with aftermaths of Sandy and it doesn't seem than anyone has learned anything from it and the devastation that it had caused... bash

Last edited by ajkula66; 02/25/14 03:54 PM.

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Paul, I think that in the Macy's instance (formerly a Hecht's store), it was more about the fact that this was/is a high-end retail store. The basement level was more important for deliveries and storage of merchandise. It is my understanding that this building was once Hecht's main distribution facility and their headquarters back before regional logistics came about. This building dates back to the 1930s. The lower levels were all about street-level access for customers. The fifth floor was designated as space for offices and utilities. Keep in mind that this store is in the heart of downtown Arlington, VA where street-level facades and access are key. There's really no flooding risk in this particular area. I would think that if this was the case, they wouldn't dare build out a new main telecommunications room in the basement.

Now that Macy's has taken over with much more advanced distribution and management operations, there is no longer a need for space for these things. It sure breaks my heart to see all of the thousands of feet of copper being pulled out of there.


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Before the rivers were cleaned up and the channels cleaned out from 100 years of pollution, the rivers flooded every year and made for basement facilities impractical. In fact, the power utility had large power distribution transformers hanging high on pole structures in allies behind all the buildings in the downtown area. It has only been in the last 25 years that they began to place even larger transformers and distribution switching facilities underground. Verizon continues to maintain facility in the upper floors of almost all the major buildings.

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In regards to services over fiber, I know that they do make business class ONT's that will deliver POTS, Ethernet (data/IPTV), RF TV, and T1 or Pseudowire connections. I would think that Verizon would have tried to install one of those to deliver your PRI circuit.

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Ed said,
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I'm speaking of the feeder and distribution F/O cables. You'll notice that they are overlashed onto the original much larger copper cables using the same steel support strand.

Ed, around here they do the same thing, but they don't actually lash anything... they just use lots and lots of electrical tape!!!

The whole FiOS system around here has a very temporary look. The loose-tube fiber doesn't require the "tennis rackets" to store the service loops, so they just coil them up. Sometimes they tape them to something, sometimes they flap in the breeze. Are they planning to do it all over again after they remove the copper, or are they not even thinking that far ahead?

As far as abandoned drops, in my Mom & Dad's neighborhood most copper drops start at a pole mounted box or the nearest access boot, and then are clipped to the PIC support strand running back to the point where they make the lateral connection to the house. When the FiOS is installed, they wad up lateral portion of the copper drop as far as the pole line, than tie it into a ball and leave it hanging mid-span at about chest height. I see dozens of these meatballs on their street, and they have been there for years.

Gotta love it.

Jim Bennett
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dexman Offline OP
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Meatballs!!! laugh

You'd think that the line person would take the extra minute or two to cut higher up. No manager of any substance would balk at that.

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