After Hurricane Sandy, Verizon found itself with miles of destroyed copper wiring in Lower Manhattan—destruction The Verge documented impressively in pictures and video—and instead of just rebuilding its network the company took the act of God as an opportunity to upgrade to fiber optics. As a bonus, the company will be able to offer a new set of customers its "triple play" suite of TV, phone and internet services. And that potential income has some landlords allegedly reaching their hands out for their cut. So Verizon is turning to government for help.
As the Times reports, Verizon has turned to the state's Public Service Commission saying that "many building owners in Lower Manhattan" have turned their workers away. "In some of these cases, building owners have demanded excessive compensation from Verizon to permit the installation of fiber-optic-facilities," the company complained. The six buildings specifically named are 2 Gold Street and 201 Pearl Street (both of which are still uninhabitable after the storm), 700 East Ninth Street, 200 Water Street, 22 River Terrace, and 11 Maiden Lane.
But the landlords aren't having any of it. An official from DSA Management, which runs 11 Maiden Lane and 700 East Ninth Street, told the Times that "tenants at 11 Maiden Lane never lost phone service because of the storm and did not need the additional services that Verizon wanted to provide." Still they didn't want to comment on the e-mail Verizon cites in which they demanded "compensation in exchange for allowing Verizon access to the building."
And TF Cornerstone, which owns the two uninhabited buildings cited, says that its focus is on "rebuilding our critical infrastructure" and denies putting any conditions on Verizon's access.
Interestingly, at issue in the scuffle to wire these buildings is that it is based on rules that used to be to Verizon's advantage. In 2007 the FCC banned a number of deals in place (like upfront door deals or profit sharing) that made installation easier as a way to help phone companies better compete with cable companies. Now the company, in trying to install wires that allow it to serve up cable, has "appealed to regulators on the need to restore telephone service but based the petition on a regulation that prohibits blocking access to cable TV providers."
