Purpose of this building?

Hey All,

Was out mountain biking West of Kendal, in the Lakes this weekend, and stumbled upon this odd looking building in what felt like the middle of no-where, and looked Fibre related given the number of manholes. Any one have an idea?

Streetview link:
https://www.google.com/maps/@54.3233849,-2.7054987,3...

Unlikely to be fibre related as it was there back in 2009 too.

It was originally a British Gas related telecoms facility, but these assets were sold to Three in the early 2000s.

https://find-and-update.company-information.service....

Edited by ft247 (Sun 09-Jan-22 02:15:12)

I can’t think what Three could be using it for. What did British Gas do with it?

In reply to a post by _Icaras_:

I can’t think what Three could be using it for. What did British Gas do with it?

Might have been some sort of regional telemetry hub for their pipeline transco

The old AHU’s suggest whatever kit was in their needed some hefty cooling.

In reply to a post by _Icaras_:

I can’t think what Three could be using it for.

If it has comms links and power it could be a really useful location to support remote mobile masts.

It appears to be a good find of the usually hidden world of fibre backhaul.

Whilst I can't vouch for its history, the overall compound appears to be owned by Three but also hosts two Zayo fibre buildings and is shown on the Zayo network maps for their northern UK network. Theres also a cable landing station just to the south on the west coast so could also be part of that route.

The planning system gives up it's secrets a little -
https://applications.southlakeland.gov.uk/fastweb/de...

Seems quiet Paddy Lane is quite the backhaul route!

In reply to a post by rupert999:

It appears to be a good find of the usually hidden world of fibre backhaul.

Whilst I can't vouch for its history, the overall compound appears to be owned by Three but also hosts two Zayo fibre buildings and is shown on the Zayo network maps for their northern UK network. Theres also a cable landing station just to the south on the west coast so could also be part of that route.

The planning system gives up it's secrets a little -
https://applications.southlakeland.gov.uk/fastweb/de...

Seems quiet Paddy Lane is quite the backhaul route!

Thanks for digging this out - It appears from plans, Zayo have 2/3 buildings but the legacy one and what appears to be still very much active is Three's building. I wonder if this is a link to some more rural mobile masts / just part of their fibre backhaul to scotland.

Here's what Colt think about it

https://i.imgur.com/8LyLDcf.png

Theres a lot of history here - most of which comes from National Grid Transco, which was highlighted earlier.

From what I can piece together - Transco back in 01 was owned by Lattice Group who also had a subdivision called '186k' (indeed you can still see this on some manhole covers). 186k deployed fibre alongside Transco gas pipelines.

(If you map the National Grid gas backbone and Zayos network, they match pretty much 1-4-1 on the routes taken)

Fast forward through telecom boom and bust -
- 186k signed up Three as a backbone fibre provider
- Lattice also had a second company called SST providing 'telecom tower services' (probably also used by Three)
- Transco went to merge with National Grid, but it appears they had to divest itself of 186k
- A company called 'Geo Networks' brought 186k (Geo being Hutchinson, aka Three)
- Geo Networks eventually struggled and was brought out by Zayo

TL;DR -
- 186k laid the initial fibre
- Three were a customer of 186k
- Geo (Three) brought out 186k
- Zayo brought out Geo (Three)

Are they using it for tower backhaul, probably, but only someone from Three/Zayo could answer the exact function(s) of the building(s)

Love threads like this, great little nuggets of information thank you.

Wonder if Energys (or whoever owns it now) have similar infrastructure for the fibre network strung from national grid electricity pylons.

In reply to a post by PhilipSmith72:

Wonder if Energys (or whoever owns it now)

Vodafone (via C&W) -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energis

I’d be interested in understanding the how part of this.

I had no idea fibre was deployed alongside gas pipelines, and burying new fibre in Cumbria would be prohibitively expensive. Hence why Openreach rule up there!

So from what you’re saying fibre has indeed been laid there by a third party, but I assume not dug and ducted in? I always pictured gas pipelines as being a huge pipe buried underground, but is it in fact a pipe within a duct so that the fibre can be pushed alongside it to avoid expensive digging? I’ve seen some gas pipelines above ground but these just seem to pop up for a short run and then go underground again.

Maybe the fibre is in the gas pipe...

That seems somewhat unlikely though

Surely is it just fibre buried alongside the gas pipeline, once you've got everything in place to get a gas pipe installed you've done most of the stuff needed to put a duct in for fibre.

I've always assumed that for big backhaul links like this that they aren't putting in ducts to fill with fibre later, but putting in big bundles of fibre in one go ?

I think it's a combination: they install big ducts, and inside those they pull subducts, and inside those they blow thick fibre cables with hundreds of strands.

So not inside the gas pipe then

Shame, that idea sounded exciting...

In reply to a post by andynormancx:

So not inside the gas pipe then

Shame, that idea sounded exciting...

sounded like an explosive idea to me, "i'm off for a smoking break, finish blowing that fibre for me"

It would have been laid in ducts alongside the pipelines when they were last refreshed - makes sense to only dig once.

A whole heap of fibre was laid around the dot.com boom time - alongside rail, in all the canals, pylons, gas pipelines. Geo also pioneered laying in the sewers. The only downside is some of this older fibre is of a different spec which can limit it's use and the type of optics required to drive it. It can still do 10 of gigs per second.. 1st world problems eh?

The fantastic hidden world of infrastructure which I love.

Yes the great telecoms bubble of the late nineties and early noughties. Which came to a rude and abrupt stop in 2001.

I believe they wanted to deploy in the canals initially for speed and ease, but British Waterways at the time objected so they ran ducts alongside the canals (like the HV network) rather than in the canals.

However we’ve collectively benefited in the decades since, from this massive over expansion in capacity when they were flush with (borrowed) cash. Any parallels to modern times…😎 Nah

That makes sense-when the gas pipes were refreshed they added sun ducts.

In reply to a post by PhilipSmith72:

Love threads like this, great little nuggets of information thank you.

Wonder if Energys (or whoever owns it now) have similar infrastructure for the fibre network strung from national grid electricity pylons.

A lot of information like that can be found in this quite entertaining video from UKNOF https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I3XxniJdh8