At least 95 percent of Vermont residents will have access to broadband by the end of today, because of a combination of private investment, public funding, and innovative service solutions for some of the state’s most rural areas.

State officials say 2012 was an important year for broadband availability in Vermont, as dominant phone company FairPoint Communications made inroads in expanding its DSL service in areas that never had access before.

In 2011, Governor Shumlin set an ambitious goal to see 100 percent of Vermont covered by broadband by the end of 2013, and the state appears on track to achieve that target in the coming year.

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Gov. Shumlin answered questions from state residents regarding his plan to see 100% broadband coverage in Vermont by the end of 2013. (Feb. 3 2011) (3 minutes)

Vermont’s small size would seem to make it an easy target for total broadband coverage, but significant rural areas have made it unprofitable for commercial phone and cable companies to make inroads.

Comcast, the state’s largest cable operator, has not grown much geographically over the past five years. FairPoint, which took control of much of the state’s landline network from Verizon in 2008, has been compelled to achieve broadband expansion as part of an agreement that approved the sale.

Karen Marshall, who heads a state effort to expand both cell phone and broadband access in Vermont says the remaining areas without coverage will be a difficult challenge, but one that can be achieved with the help of private and public investment.

“The last 5 percent are the needle in the haystack,” Marshall told Vermont Public Radio. “They are the most far-flung, probably the most expensive and sometimes even the most physically challenging to get to.”

Wireless is often the most cost-effective solution, both for broadband and cell expansion, and Marshall suggested Vermont would use microcell technology along Vermont’s rural roadways.

“I think we will be one of the first places in the country that is deploying microcell technology for example, on the top of telephone poles or utility poles, kind of like a daisy chain,” Marshall said.

The rural Vermont Telephone Company won a $5 million state grant to cover Vermont’s southernmost counties with a combination of wireless phone and broadband service.

While areas of rural Vermont will likely have broadband access for the first time, improvements have also been available to those who already have the service.

Marshall estimated the average broadband speed in the state has increased from 5.5 to 9.7Mbps, which is above the national average.

Vermont Public Radio surveys how the state is doing meeting Gov. Shumlin’s goal to see broadband service available to every Vermonter. (December 28, 2012) (2 minutes)
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Bloomberg TV investigates how much those sports channels are costing you as part of your monthly cable bill. The surprising answer: many times more than America’s most familiar basic cable networks.  (1 minute)

The largest share of your cable bill in 2013 will go to cover just one genre of television programming: sports.

Leo Hindery, Intermedia’s managing partner, claims $50 of your monthly cable bill will cover networks like ESPN, YES, NFL Network, and a wide range of national and regional sports networks, whether you watch them or not.

Appearing on Bloomberg TV’s “Bloomberg Surveillance,” Hindery says there is no end in sight for sports programming-related rate hikes. They have increased 16% in just the past two years.

Hindery noted in the beginning sports cable networks largely covered national, pro teams. But the newest wave of networks cover collegiate sports, at prices nearly as high as ESPN charges its cable affiliates. With just about every major sport now sporting its own cable network, the possibilities and the accompanying rate increases are endless.

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“Next year, we will pay directly or indirectly something on the average of $50 [a month] for sports which we didn’t ask for,” Hindery said. “It’s not a-la-carte, it is part of the bundle.”  (4 minutes)

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has called Verizon’s notification that phone service in lower Manhattan will not be back to normal until late next spring “unacceptable.”

Hurricane Sandy’s storm surge ruined at least 95 percent of Verizon Communications’ landline network in the lower half of Manhattan leaving numerous businesses without phone service with little hope service will be restored this year.

“Their schedule right now says that lower Manhattan is not going to be back up until May,” Bloomberg said in a recent speech.

The mayor is upset with Verizon’s timetable because a number of major buildings in the area cannot be reoccupied by business tenants until telephone service is restored, and Verizon is facing questions about why it will take a half-year to get phone service back up and running to everyone that wants it.

When local cable news channel NY1 asked Verizon how many customers were still without service, a spokesman told the reporter it did not know, adding some customers have priorities more pressing than phone service.

Verizon has chosen not to replace much of the damaged copper infrastructure and plans to invest in more reliable fiber optics in its ongoing effort to meet its FiOS rollout obligations in New York City, but that does not satisfy many business owners who cannot process credit card transactions or, in some cases, run their businesses as long as phone lines remain out of service.

This week a coalition of interest groups petitioned New York’s Public Service Commission asking them to impose new requirements on the state’s utility companies to develop comprehensive emergency response plans that acknowledge climate change and the extreme weather events that accompany it.

The petition was filed by the Columbia Law School Center for Climate Change Law, Natural Resources Defense Council, New York League of Conservation Voters, Pace Energy and Climate Law Center of Pace Law School, Municipal Art Society of New York, Earthjustice, Environmental Advocates of New York, and Riverkeeper.

The petition notes in the past two years alone, New York City has been hit by two of the largest hurricanes in history (Irene and Sandy).

The group’s observations are shared by some of the state’s highest elected officials.

“In just 14 months, two hurricanes have forced [New York City] to evacuate neighborhoods — something our city government had never done before,” New York City Mayor Bloomberg wrote in an editorial for Bloomberg View. “If this is a trend, it is simply not sustainable.”

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo echoed Bloomberg’s concerns:

Extreme weather is a reality. It is a reality that we are vulnerable. And if we’re going to do our job as elected officials, we’re going to need to think about how to redesign, or as we go forward, make the modifications necessary so we don’t incur this type of damage…. For us to sit here today and say this is a once-in-a-generation and it’s not going to happen again, I think would be short-sighted…. I think we need to anticipate more of these extreme weather type situations in the future and we have to take that into consideration in reforming, modifying, our infrastructure.

The coalition claims current utility policies are designed for short-term disaster response procedures, which they call inadequate.

Most utility companies develop plans based on historic weather patterns the environmental groups argue cannot take into account the more extreme weather patterns afflicting the state. The PSC can mandate utilities do more.

New York’s utility infrastructure is also deemed outdated, with much of it exposed above-ground, vulnerable to storm damage. The state also lacks more advanced technology including smart electricity grids, telecommunications fiber rings that can reroute around cable cuts, and reinforcement of vulnerably placed generator plants, telephone switches, and utility substations.

Despite the criticism, Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam remained upbeat about Verizon’s performance, particularly noting strong growth in wireless.

In the third quarter when Sandy struck, Verizon picked up 1.54 million more contract customers, exceeding the 901,000 estimate predicted by analysts polled by Bloomberg News. The wireless profit margin at Verizon also reached a new milestone – 50 percent, up from 49 percent in the second quarter.

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NY1 reports business customers in lower Manhattan are not too pleased waiting for Verizon to repair their landlines.  (2 minutes)

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Verizon produced this video showing off its own restoration efforts in a downtown Manhattan cable vault.  (3 minutes)

Eight channels are missing from Raleigh-area televisions.

Time Warner Cable dropped eight analog channels from its lineup in Raleigh recently, advising customers they will need either a digital transport adapter (DTA) or standard set top box to get those channels back.

But one Raleigh customer tells Stop the Cap! those DTA boxes are hard to come by at the moment, forcing some to get costly set top boxes instead.

“We have been told three times by Time Warner Cable there is a multi-week wait for the free boxes, but we can get all the set top boxes we want today, for more than $6 a month each,” complains Rachel, who has three TV’s that need a box solution. “You think they would have waited for enough equipment before they took the channels away.”

Now missing from the analog lineup: C-SPAN, CMT, Oprah Winfrey Network, VH-1 Classics, Discovery Fitness & Health, Lifetime Movie Network, TruTV and the Golf Channel.

Jim DuBreck thought he had nothing to worry about when Time Warner sent him a postcard alerting him those eight channels were only going to be available in digital starting this month. He told ABC11 he already has a digital TV. Time Warner did not tell him that was not enough to keep watching.

DuBreck later learned the cable company not only converted the channels to digital, it also encrypted them. His digital TV would still need either a set top box or DTA. Only he is still waiting for the five DTA boxes for his own televisions.

Time Warner told the station they have seen a much higher demand than anticipated for the adapters. So, there may be some temporary delays before receiving one. DTA boxes are free for two years, set top boxes are not.

Customers better get used to it. Time Warner is gradually converting their systems to digital lineups, so as time goes by, more analog channels will disappear.

Time Warner Cable explained why:

“Moving analog channels to digital frees up capacity in our network to bring customers faster internet like we just did last week when we boosted the speeds of our standard internet service by 50 percent. Providing channels digitally also allows us to offer customers more because it’s dramatically more efficient: We can deliver up to four HD channels, or as many as 12 standard-definition digital channels, using the same capacity as it takes to carry one analog channel.”

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WTVD in Raleigh helps Time Warner Cable customers understand where some of their analog channels are going.  (3 minutes)