> The exchanges aren't just city centre buildings.
> There are also smaller buildings, which I suppose are technically
> concentrators rather than exchanges,

4,500 of the buildings contain only concentrators including many large
buildings that previously had mechanical exchanges, the leases on all these
will go in the next 15 to 20 years as leased lines and other special stuff is
moved elsewhere.

The 1,000 odd buildings Openreach plans to keep are mostly those with the
exchange processors supporting several local and remote concentrators that
actually terminate copper pairs, and also where other operators interconnect
with Openreach. They are effectively data centres.

Angus

On Thu, 12 Oct 2023 19:16 +0100 (BST), angus@magsys.co.uk (Angus Robertson - Magenta Systems Ltd)
wrote:

>> The exchanges aren't just city centre buildings.
>> There are also smaller buildings, which I suppose are technically
>> concentrators rather than exchanges,
>
>4,500 of the buildings contain only concentrators including many large
>buildings that previously had mechanical exchanges, the leases on all these
>will go in the next 15 to 20 years as leased lines and other special stuff is
>moved elsewhere.
>
>The 1,000 odd buildings Openreach plans to keep are mostly those with the
>exchange processors supporting several local and remote concentrators that
>actually terminate copper pairs, and also where other operators interconnect
>with Openreach. They are effectively data centres.
>
>Angus

There's an excellent site run by an enthusiast who is gradually documenting all these exchange
buildings - https://telephone-exchanges.org.uk/

Codger wrote:

[snip]

>
> There's an excellent site run by an enthusiast who is gradually documenting all these exchange
> buildings - https://telephone-exchanges.org.uk/
>

Ah yes, Mike Fletcher. I think he works with Andrew Emmerson - another
noted telephone historian ....

--
Graham J

Codger <codger524@gmail.com> writes:

> On Thu, 12 Oct 2023 19:16 +0100 (BST), angus@magsys.co.uk (Angus
> Robertson - Magenta Systems Ltd)
> wrote:
>
>>> The exchanges aren't just city centre buildings. There are also
>>> smaller buildings, which I suppose are technically concentrators
>>> rather than exchanges,
>>
>>4,500 of the buildings contain only concentrators including many large
>>buildings that previously had mechanical exchanges, the leases on all
>>these will go in the next 15 to 20 years as leased lines and other
>>special stuff is moved elsewhere.
>>
>>The 1,000 odd buildings Openreach plans to keep are mostly those with
>>the exchange processors supporting several local and remote
>>concentrators that actually terminate copper pairs, and also where
>>other operators interconnect with Openreach. They are effectively data
>>centres.
>>
>>Angus
>
> There's an excellent site run by an enthusiast who is gradually
> documenting all these exchange buildings -
> https://telephone-exchanges.org.uk/

Brilliant. But Bristol isn't on there. I must go out and take a photo of
my exchange.

On 11 Oct 2023 11:42, Graham J wrote:
> Graham J wrote:
>> A friend in a rural location has been quoted £1,030,689.70 for FTTP.
>> When Openreach discontinue his POTS service will they be obliged to
>> provide him with an alternative voice service?
>>
>> There's very little mobile coverage at his house - it's just about
>> possible to make a call when hanging out of the window of an upstairs
>> bedroom.
>>
>>
>
>
> OP here.
>
> My friend reports:
>
> "We have had extended talks with both Openreach and BT. As a result we
> have been assured that there was no chance of connection to any digital
> pathway but that our copper line would remain available even after the
> general cut off date. "
>
> I wonder who in Openreach had the authority to make that assurance?

I think that saying the copper line will remain isn't very hard to
commit to but they haven't said if a service provider will offer service

On 12 Oct 2023 08:32, Graham J wrote:
> Mike Humphrey wrote:
>> On Wed, 11 Oct 2023 07:59:33 +0100, Graham J wrote:
>>> A friend in a rural location has been quoted £1,030,689.70 for FTTP.
>>> When Openreach discontinue his POTS service will they be obliged to
>>> provide him with an alternative voice service?
>>
>> Yes - but it seems that they're not discontinuing POTS as soon as you
>> might think. In a discussion with our suppliers about a similar situation,
>> they've told us that Openreach has a new product in the pipeline that's
>> basically a copper pair to a VOIP adaptor in the exchange - so from the
>> end user point of view, a POTS line the same as they always had. It will
>> only be available if they can't offer you anything else.
>>
>> In fact it seems that Openreach aren't going to be offering multiple
>> options at all in future. If FTTP is available, that's all you'll be able
>> to get. If not, but SOGEA FTTC is available, that's all you can get. And
>> if that's not available, they work down the list of "transitional"
>> products.
>
>
> The idea that Openreach has is that when they completely discontinue
> POTS there will no longer be any need for an "Exchange", so those -
> often town centre - buildings can be sold off for profit.
>
> So "a copper pair to a VOIP adaptor" I understand, but where will it be
> placed when there is no longer an exchange?

At the OHP

> My friend has a landline phone service. Is there still a USO which
> obliges Openreach to supply a voice service to a new customer in a
> similar impossibly rural situation? How would that be implemented?
>

ECC will apply as it always did.

On 11/10/2023 13:04, David Wade wrote:
> There are satellite services, for both phone and internet, but they are
> not cheap. Until recently geostationary satellites were used for
> internet but because they are in a high orbit you get high latency.

It used to be said that Satphones were often cheaper than the rates
hotels charge for telephone calls.

A friend in the US made this comment recently.

"It’s a pity that Iridium was crippled just before its commercial
launch. The WHO and UN canceled their contracts, which made it
impossible to build enough lower cost handsets to launch a "$1 per
minute anywhere in the World "service that could have wiped out
international landlines services. I was paying about $15 a minute from
India to the US at the time. My Iridium phone was great. It wasn’t as
versatile as modern cellphones because of the need to find a satellite,
but it really did work everywhere that I ever needed it to. It also
shared the same number as my Sprint cellphone, so people didn’t need to
know another number. Sprint switched the call to Iridium if there was no
response from the cellphone. Iridium is still going, mainly for the DoD,
news services and the Red Cross, but it has many competitors now, of
course."