Canada is NOT a telecom infrastructure nightmare
Man it pisses me off. It is on oft-repeated Canadian trope that the reason why our cellular and internet costs are so high is because Canada is a logistical infrastructure nightmare. We have 1/10 the US population, but more than double the land. Or so the story goes.
Where are the problems? Well, it IS true that the population is about 1/10th the size and that the landmass is about double the size. But, for this to be a valid argument 2 other factors would need to be true: Canada would need to also have a similar population distribution. And the average Canadian citizen would need to be receiving the same level of service as the average American.
I mean, we can only compare average costs directly to infrastructure concerns if those costs are paying to give the average citizens of both countries the same average service. It doesn't make sense to compare, infrastructure costs for someone receiving 2G service to someone receiving LTE. So, let's stick with LTE as that is where we are right now, and what companies are generally investing in servicing.
To start, here are some websites with some population density heat maps of Canada and the US.
Notice anything? Because I sure do. Aside from a region of low population density, inland around the Rocky Mountains, the US is fairly densely population... just about everywhere. Which means that... hmm maybe 60% of the total landmass needs infrastructure to service the majority of citizens. And with double the population of all of Canada in that area. But, my experience with the US, is that a lot of that low density region is still populated enough to get good cell signal, so probably... closer to 85% of mainland US.
Canada on the other hand? Yep! Most of Canada is UNINHABITED and considered by and large to be uninhabitable. We're LUCKY if that densely populated area amounts to even 25% of the landmass of Canada. But, truthfully... it is probably closer to 10-15%. Oops! All of a sudden the population vs. landmass of Canada isn't such a compelling argument any more is it?
Want an even funnier infographic. Look at these. Scroll down to the speed test coverage. And the coverage is even more pathetic. The same site doesn't have that coverage map for the US. So, I can't get a good apples to apples comparison. But, from a logistics standpoint, Canada isn't really twice the size of the US. It is much more like 1/5th the size. Or even less.
Now, the US does have 10x the population. So, even if we assume Canada is effectively 1/5th the size, that still leaves a leg to stand on for the telcos that the average populated Canadian region is half as dense as the average US region. But, for this to be a problem it assumes that densely populated regions don't require additional infrastructure to serve everyone.
I mean, it doesn't make any sense to complain about population density if the density is already above the point where a single node can handle all of the traffic. Extrapolating from some posts here, and this site. One site suggested 60 (that's right, just SIXTY) users max for data at one time.
Now, that is not total network users. It is just active users. But, it also has to work during peak hours. I mean, aside from during major events like mass power outages and the likes, I've never experienced network connectivity errors. How many people need to be in a region, at peak times to reach that number of active connections?
Well, let's be generous and say that at peak network access time, only 1% of the population is using data. A single cell tower then could handle a population of.... 6000. OUCH man. That barely counts as a small city. And with the range of these towers, many of the smallest cities are close enough to a major city. And, in many cases, small townships which are further flung from big cities don't even get LTE access.
In summary, anywhere there are at least 6000 people, or whatever that magic number is, the amount of infrastructure required is a non-factor. And whatever that number is, both Canadian and US telecom companies have a tendency to simply not invest or not invest as aggressively in rural areas to begin with. Put another way... if the number of subscribers in a region is below a certain amount, they don't even bother. A point which fundamentally sinks any infrastructure debate without any even needing to analyze anything else.
And we haven't even touched the elephants in the room. Hawaii and Alaska. Look at those population heat maps for Canada again, and then look at the LTE coverage maps. Pretty much every Canadian serviced by those telecom companies live along a contiguous stretch of uninterrupted land. In fact, that line of population basically follows the Trans-Canada highway. A single highway that runs from the East to West of Canada.
We don't have any major, cell serviced islands hundred to thousands of miles away from the mainland. Or an entire state with a Canada in between it and the rest of the country. From an LTE network perspective... all of Canada lives in a clean line from East to West, uninterrupted.
When I consider the infrastructure hurdles like dealing with network loads in the mega dense cities in states like California, Washington and New York, or the remote regions like Alaska and Hawaii... I find it REALLY hard to believe that Canada is in any way shape or form more of an infrastructure challenge.
What am I missing?
Where are the problems? Well, it IS true that the population is about 1/10th the size and that the landmass is about double the size. But, for this to be a valid argument 2 other factors would need to be true: Canada would need to also have a similar population distribution. And the average Canadian citizen would need to be receiving the same level of service as the average American.
I mean, we can only compare average costs directly to infrastructure concerns if those costs are paying to give the average citizens of both countries the same average service. It doesn't make sense to compare, infrastructure costs for someone receiving 2G service to someone receiving LTE. So, let's stick with LTE as that is where we are right now, and what companies are generally investing in servicing.
To start, here are some websites with some population density heat maps of Canada and the US.
Notice anything? Because I sure do. Aside from a region of low population density, inland around the Rocky Mountains, the US is fairly densely population... just about everywhere. Which means that... hmm maybe 60% of the total landmass needs infrastructure to service the majority of citizens. And with double the population of all of Canada in that area. But, my experience with the US, is that a lot of that low density region is still populated enough to get good cell signal, so probably... closer to 85% of mainland US.
Canada on the other hand? Yep! Most of Canada is UNINHABITED and considered by and large to be uninhabitable. We're LUCKY if that densely populated area amounts to even 25% of the landmass of Canada. But, truthfully... it is probably closer to 10-15%. Oops! All of a sudden the population vs. landmass of Canada isn't such a compelling argument any more is it?
Want an even funnier infographic. Look at these. Scroll down to the speed test coverage. And the coverage is even more pathetic. The same site doesn't have that coverage map for the US. So, I can't get a good apples to apples comparison. But, from a logistics standpoint, Canada isn't really twice the size of the US. It is much more like 1/5th the size. Or even less.
Now, the US does have 10x the population. So, even if we assume Canada is effectively 1/5th the size, that still leaves a leg to stand on for the telcos that the average populated Canadian region is half as dense as the average US region. But, for this to be a problem it assumes that densely populated regions don't require additional infrastructure to serve everyone.
I mean, it doesn't make any sense to complain about population density if the density is already above the point where a single node can handle all of the traffic. Extrapolating from some posts here, and this site. One site suggested 60 (that's right, just SIXTY) users max for data at one time.
Now, that is not total network users. It is just active users. But, it also has to work during peak hours. I mean, aside from during major events like mass power outages and the likes, I've never experienced network connectivity errors. How many people need to be in a region, at peak times to reach that number of active connections?
Well, let's be generous and say that at peak network access time, only 1% of the population is using data. A single cell tower then could handle a population of.... 6000. OUCH man. That barely counts as a small city. And with the range of these towers, many of the smallest cities are close enough to a major city. And, in many cases, small townships which are further flung from big cities don't even get LTE access.
In summary, anywhere there are at least 6000 people, or whatever that magic number is, the amount of infrastructure required is a non-factor. And whatever that number is, both Canadian and US telecom companies have a tendency to simply not invest or not invest as aggressively in rural areas to begin with. Put another way... if the number of subscribers in a region is below a certain amount, they don't even bother. A point which fundamentally sinks any infrastructure debate without any even needing to analyze anything else.
And we haven't even touched the elephants in the room. Hawaii and Alaska. Look at those population heat maps for Canada again, and then look at the LTE coverage maps. Pretty much every Canadian serviced by those telecom companies live along a contiguous stretch of uninterrupted land. In fact, that line of population basically follows the Trans-Canada highway. A single highway that runs from the East to West of Canada.
We don't have any major, cell serviced islands hundred to thousands of miles away from the mainland. Or an entire state with a Canada in between it and the rest of the country. From an LTE network perspective... all of Canada lives in a clean line from East to West, uninterrupted.
When I consider the infrastructure hurdles like dealing with network loads in the mega dense cities in states like California, Washington and New York, or the remote regions like Alaska and Hawaii... I find it REALLY hard to believe that Canada is in any way shape or form more of an infrastructure challenge.
What am I missing?
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