A test of the SiFi Networks internet system that buried fiber optic cable in “microtrenches” along public streets in Saratoga Springs has failed, Commissioner of Public Works, Jason Golub told the city council at the Tuesday evening council meeting June 7. Another test is planned starting next week.
The test on south Broadway and Evergreen Drive looked particularly at the microtrenches, just a few inches wide a couple feet deep, into which SiFi lay fiber optic cable.
“DPW and engineering inspected the installation from November through April to determine the trial had failed,” Golub said. The trenches are filled and then patched, but the patches did not hold up to Saratoga Springs’ winter and caused further damage to the roadway, Golub said.
Sifi’s network would bring fiber optic cable to each home in the city. The installation would be free, but homes that chose to use their network would pay internet service providers for access.
Former DPW Commissioner Anthony “Skip” Scirocco feared the test would fail.
He and then-Commissioner of Finance Michele Madigan last year argued loudly over the viability of the network, which Madigan brought to the city council as a way to have competition for Spectrum cable, the other broadband-to-the-home provider in the city.
Scirocco said time and again that DPW engineers needed to study the microtrenching more completely before he could agree to installation permits for the system. A main fear was that the trenches would ruin the roadways, and the city would be on the hook for repairs.
The test was a compromise. SiFi lay only 10,000 feet of cable in two locations in the city rather than moving forward with a full installation.
[Read more about the SiFi test here.]
The testing is not over.
“Sifi has proposed locating their trench in the city’s right of way, in the greenspace between the sidewalk and the curb,” Golub told the board. He said DPW has examined this idea and they are OK with another test, scheduled to begin next week, near the Charles McTygue City Garage at the corner of Division and Van Rensselaer streets.
"That's the way we do it in most of the cities," in the greenspace, or "behind the curb," said Shawn Parker with SiFi Networks. "Most of the time we try to avoid the roads as much as possible."
SiFi plans to send people to the next council meeting to discuss the plans, Golub said.
Given that the city right-of-way is often a strip of unpaved, grassy land, Mayor Ron Kim asked: “So, are we cutting down trees?”
“That’s why they’re [SiFi is] coming” to the next meeting, Golub said.
Commissioner of Finance Minita Sanghvi said she was happy to get the update. As the Commissioner of Finance, she was getting calls, with people assuming she had taken on Madigan’s role in the debate. She has not, she said, but now she can report something to the public.
DPW staff return did not return calls for comment by posting time.
Update: Sifi Networks' contacted us just after we posted. We have updated the story.