Region's Telephone Service Slowly Improving

After more than two weeks of sporadic service because of Hurricane Katrina, telephone lines in southeastern Louisiana are slowly returning to normal as phone companies not only repair storm-damaged networks but adjust their systems to contend with population shifts. Meanwhile, the Louisiana Public Service Commission on Wednesday asked wireless phone companies in the state to give customers free service for September and October because wireless phones have become the only means of communication for many evacuees. Whether they will remains an open question. Despite the overall improvement in phone service, about 150,000 BellSouth Corp. phone lines remained dead Wednesday, mostly in the parishes of Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines and St. Bernard, said Merlin Villar, a spokesman for the region's biggest local phone service provider. Much of those parishes remain evacuated. BellSouth workers have repaired more than 100 breaks in the company's buried fiber-optic cable network that serves as the backbone of the region's local phone system. AT&T technicians had installed a new fiber-optic line between the Mississippi state line and Bay St. Louis, Miss., to bypass a pair of flooded computer switches in eastern New Orleans that are part of the long-distance company's high-capacity network in the region. Wireless phone companies also have repaired antennas, also known as cell sites, in areas that weren't flooded. Even with the progress, dialing into the region from outside Louisiana remained a problem for many, particularly during peak calling hours. To prevent the high calling volumes from jamming networks, some long-distance companies were limiting incoming calls so outgoing calls from storm victims and relief workers could be completed.