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San Leandro Commercial Broadband Strategy <br />Wireless carriers claim to serve <br />this area but, as noted above, <br />wireless service is not always <br />actually available in claimed <br />service areas. Comcast claims to <br />provide cable modem service to <br />one street in the area. <br />Otherwise, the area depends <br />solely on AT &T's legacy copper <br />wires for broadband service. <br />Business owners in this area and <br />smaller service providers report <br />that these lines cannot support <br />even the minimal, decades -old <br />T -1 service standard. <br />For example, staff of a chemical company located in this area reports that they have had <br />trouble obtaining reliable commercial grade broadband service. Originally, they used a <br />microwave -based service that delivered adequate performance, but that service is no <br />longer available. Currently, they are paying for a T -1 class connection, but it is <br />unreliable and only performs at about two - thirds of its rated speed. The company <br />considers this situation to be unacceptable and a detriment to conducting business. <br />Although AT &T denies there is a complete lack of modern telecommunications <br />facilities, its representatives admit to having problems in the area and do not contest the <br />specific reports of broadband unavailability. The CPUC's data similarly supports a <br />conclusion that substandard service exists in at least some of this area. <br />Improved broadband service availability will create an opportunity to upgrade and <br />reposition blighted and underutilized properties in this area. <br />5 A significant portion of the basic infrastructure that supports local telephone and broadband connectivity <br />is comprised of bundles of copper wire that were installed more than fifty years ago by the former Bell <br />System. The T -1 standard was introduced in 1961 in order to support a bi- directional speed of 1.5 Mbps at <br />a high quality -of- service level, using the copper wires of the time. Because it is a dedicated and managed <br />circuit, its performance is usually substantially better than shared services such as DSL or cable modem, <br />even in cases where the claimed top speed of those shared services is many times higher. A T -1 circuit is <br />generally considered to be the lowest level of service that can be described as industrial or carrier grade. <br />16 July 2012 TellusVenture Associates Page 13 <br />