Well Chelsea exchange as it was didnt have a car park at all. Its was in a residential road so that was a non starter.
The cabs are scattered around as you'd otherwise expect.

In reply to a post by kitcat:

Icarus

BT kit as in PSTN will supposedly all be gone by 2025, ( Great for scrappies!)

BT ADSL kit is also on the way out with a push to FTTC / FTTP in the same timescales. BT Retail is trying to supply all BB over FTTC / FTTP where it is available which will be most if not all these sites.

Only EO lines to be addressed to remove all ADSL, which certainly happened in Chelsea when it closed

Only BT kit left is PC and metro/core. PC in London are mainly ethernet / fibre and most are no longer with BT. Just the Metro/core to sort which can be done as the existing kit goes obsolete over the next 5 years..

There’s a lot more BT kit other than Metro/Core in large exchanges though. As I say MUAs have all sorts in there.

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

In reply to a post by heathrow:

Presumably the way to address EO lines is to stick a couple of cabinets outside the exchange?

Yes.
They even do (or did) this on smaller exchanges without fibre services.

It really is the best/easiest place to install a new cabinet. All the copper meets there anyway. There's usually power. If no fibre for miles, there's usually ducting linking the exchange to the Head-End.

It's only useful for Exchange Only lines close enough to the exchange though.



I'm not sure how much FTTC is being installed now.
The preferred upgrade for EO lines will be FTTP if possible.

Most of the exchanges that make sense to put an FTTC cabinet outside will probably have 1 by now.

Certainly this has happened in rural areas. Here's Dawes Green exchange in Surrey - a glorified shed. Swing the camera around - spot the FTTC cabinet https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x4875e5c80daf5...

(I'm old enough to remember when DG had 3 digit numbers - mid 1980s before Dorking went digital)


The Seven Stars pub nearby is quoted a minimum rate for FTTC of 74 Mbps..

Edited by heathrow (Sat 23-Jan-21 16:06:08)

Think about it:

a) At the group level, BT has the Telereal leases expiring in 2030. You'd expect rents to shift up.

b) PSTN switch off in 2025 means that you need a lot less space - all the PSTN kit goes. FTTC/P lines will be parented off handover exchanges. Only ADSL/SOGEA lines will still run to those exchanges.

c) For small rural exchanges there's unlikely to be third party kit in them...


So many exchanges are now irrelevant,

One question though - how does OR/BT handle lines which are ADSL based - i,e not served by FTTC and not FTTP?

heathrow

BT is moving away from ADSL, it is no longer promoted for non EO lines on the BT site and they try to only provide it on EO lines where there is no choice.

Where they close an exchange ( a la Chelsea) and provide FTTC cabs across the area the EO ADSL customers are moved to the equivalent package via FTTC (or FTTP).

Once PSTN is turned off this is even easier as you do not need to move the Cu pairs to another exchange just do an AO transfer in the new cab and cut the copper. This is far cheaper than having to run new cables to a distant exchange site!

A lot of MUA kit is LLU so not BT equipment,

There was a lot of old PC kit that is no longer in use, but it is all mixed up with working circuits at present. With the race to ethernet it is assumed that this will all be gone by 2025. The fun is finding the 1 working circuit that has been forgotten about usually a Utility monitoring line or alarm circuit!

I understand that - but what's the plan for very long lines which are miles from either the cabinet or the exchange?

In reply to a post by kitcat:

A lot of MUA kit is LLU so not BT equipment,

The big LLU players are already moving people over to FTTC (e.g. Talktalk charges the same for both). I think the assumption is that in a few years they won't want to run their own ADSL kit any more, as the small number of users won't justify the cost of the exchange hosting and backhaul.

In reply to a post by heathrow:

I understand that - but what's the plan for very long lines which are miles from either the cabinet or the exchange?

I presume these are currently getting below USO speeds (10 Mbps). Therefore they'd look at USO solutions: possibly 4G, possibly FTTP. By 2025 geographical 4G coverage should be much higher than it is today, and several Starlink-type services may be available.

In the long term I don't see any operator maintaining in-exchange DSLAMs to provide ultra-slow DSL to a handful of lines.

Very slightly off topic (?), but is the a USO for a telephone service, especially for those who live far from their nearest exchange and can't have broadband? All they want is a phone line, in other words a POTS.

There are plenty of places where mobile coverage is poor, so not an option.

I am thinking of when the PSTN service closes.

Cheers!