California Telecommunications Infrastructure Strategy Report

Enhancing California's Competitive Strength:
A Strategy for Telecommunications Infrastructure

We believe that this landmark study and report endures as one of the more carefully reasoned and measured strategies for developing any kind of advanced telecommunications and information infrastructure. If anything, the 1993 report's analysis of technology trends and its specific recommendations for reconciling an innovative competitive market with the public interest were validated by the nation's actual experience with DSL and cable modem growth, difficult unbundling rules and limited local competition over the subsequent decade.

Although seen as fairly radical in its proposals at the time, the Telecommunications Infrastructure Strategy Report was unanimously adopted by the California Public Utilities Commission and accepted by the Governor in 1993. The Report specifically:

Rejected the call for public underwriting of the cost of immediate fiber optic cable deployment to the home (a step which could have resulted in up to $100 billion in stranded investment and saddled California consumers with a burden comparable in magnitude to that resulting from the subsequent electric industry debacle)
Instead articulated a strategy for promoting the development of innovative, flexible, and cost-effective technologies which would allow new services and broadband capabilities to be delivered earlier, at lower cost, and with greater value to the diversity of needs of California businesses and consumers
Endorsed a nearly 180 degree reversal of historic California policy of resisting competitive alternatives for local and toll services, and supported steps to break key bottlenecks and promote open and effective competition across all markets
Laid out vital principles and implementation steps for ensuring that Californians would be provided with adequate consumer information and protections in a market with new and highly competitive products and services
Described essential plans for a fundamental redesign of universal service funding to support a competitive market while preserving affordable access to basic services
Proposed a specific process for expanding basic service to include a ubiquitous data/video platform by 1997 -- exploiting already available technologies such as digital subscriber line or cable modem at speeds up to 10 Mbps -- and laying the foundation for cost-effective migration over time to newer technologies.

Most of the broad principles in the report were adopted as official state policy by the California Legislature in 1994, and were considered in the debate on federal policy that culminated with Congressional passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Over the past several years, federal and state regulators have indeed adopted policies that had the legal effect of opening markets to competitors and eschewing the notion of a telephone company-controlled infrastructure for broadband. However, policymakers still have not successfully addressed several crucial elements of the report's strategy -- breaking critical bottlenecks (including local right-of-way access), completely redesigning universal service funding for a competitive framework, and providing consumers with essential information and protections for a competitive marketplace.

This study and report was developed for the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) by its Division of Strategic Planning. Ernie Ting, Principal of Ernest S. Ting and Associates, was the project supervisor. Mr. Ting also directed the development of the CPUC's internal 1991-92 Strategic Plan for the telecommunications industry, on which many elements of the Infrastructure Strategy were subsequently drawn.

The original report may be viewed at this site in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format. The report text is available in sections. Each section is available in a high-quality, but large PDF file exactly as it appeared in its original printing -- as well as a much smaller file in alternate fonts and somewhat lower resolution which will download much more quickly over dial-up connections. (Note that the smaller file was created by the use of optical character recognition software, and may contain minor errors introduced in the process of converting formats.)

Section 1 -- Cover Page, Title Page, Transmittal Letter, Acknowledgements, Contents, Executive Summary, Chapter I (A Vision for California's Telecommunications Future)
Compact Version (approx. 300KB)
High-Quality Original Format (approx. 1.8MB)

Section 2 -- Chapter II (Principles to Guide the Vision), Chapter III (Specific Policies to Encourage Innovation and Competition)
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Section 3 -- Chapter IV (Understanding the Challenge Ahead -- Why a Technology-Specific Path is Unwise), Chapter V (Critical Network Planning Issues), Chapter VI (Making the Telecommunications Infrastructure Work for California)
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Section 4 -- Appendix 1 (Specific Recommendations), Appendix 2 (List of Participants)
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Section 5 -- Appendix 3 (Agendas from Public Hearings March - July 1993), Appendix 4 (Assessment of California's Telecommunications Infrastructure Today), Notes, Glossary
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