CenturyLink's copper replacement plan could spur protests by consumers, CLECs

CenturyLink is replacing its aging copper-based wireline facilities in seven cities, potentially setting itself up for a wave of protests from consumers and competitive local exchange carriers (CLECs) that use existing facilities -- similar to those faced by Verizon and AT&T as they transition their legacy networks.
Two of the states where it will replace copper with fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) facilities are Minnesota and Washington, which are part of a broader initiative CenturyLink has taken to support 1 Gbps speed services for residential and business customers. In 2014, CenturyLink announced that it will extend its FTTH service footprint to residential and business customers in select locations in 16 cities. As part of replacement strategy, CenturyLink is deploying a FTTH overlay architecture that the company says will enable it to support more of its customers transitioning to broadband services. "Growth in the area requires CenturyLink to install Fiber Based Access to its customer," CenturyLink said in a Federal Communications Commission filing. "The copper loops will be replaced by fiber loops as customers migrate to higher speed Broadband Internet Access (BIA)." CenturyLink added that unbundled copper loops "may not be available to an individual address after the planned completion/retirement date." Outside of Minnesota and Washington, CenturyLink filed separate copper retirement notices in six other states: Alabama, Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin.