A regional strategy to deal with connectivity issues in the area has been endorsed by the Cowichan Valley Regional District’s committee of the whole.
After months of research and input from Cowichan communities, the CVRD’s economic development division and consultants from the IBI Group made a presentation to the committee on March 22 that outlined 28 recommendations for the district to consider to address communication gaps in the Cowichan Valley.
Particularly of concern are areas that have been determined to be the district’s most under-served; the Cowichan Lake area, the Ditidaht First Nation, Cowichan Station, and Thetis and Penelakut islands.
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A staff report by EDD manager Barry O’Riordan said Cowichan Lake has a combination of areas that are served well with internet and cellular connectivity, and areas of concern which include Youbou, Honeymoon Bay, Caycuse, and the outskirts of the Town of Lake Cowichan.
O’Riordan said that while unconfirmed, evidence suggests that a fibre backbone is present in Lake Cowichan, but it has not been extended out to any homes or businesses.
“A multi-phased approach is recommended where a service provider is engaged to extend fibre backbone out from the town to Youbou and Honeymoon Bay to serve new telecommunications towers in both towns,” he said.
“Once in place, the backbone improves the business case for an internet-service provider to extend fibre…throughout the region.”
O’Riordan said Ditidaht First Nation is currently served by a patchwork of fibre, coax and satellite solutions, with a low-bandwidth microwave back-haul from Youbou.
“A new Connected Coast fibre landing site is planned for this community,” he said.
“The recommendation is to engage an internet service provider to apply for funding to build a new fibre to the premises network from the Connected Coast landing site.”
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The Connected Coast project, an approximately $45-million project that is being paid for by Ottawa, will see the placement of sub-sea fibre-optic cables from north of Prince Rupert to Haida Gwaii and south along the B.C. coast to Vancouver and around Vancouver Island to increase connectivity in remote communities.
As for the Cowichan Station area, O’Riordan said it has areas of under-served homes clustered mainly along Mountain Road and Riverside Road, which are currently served by outdated infrastructure.
He said attendees at the public-engagement session in the area expressed a strong desire for fibre service over wireless, citing health concerns related to wireless services.
“In order for the community to have long-term control over the types of technologies deployed, a community-owned fibre network covering all of Cowichan Station would need to be built,” he said.
“Since this option entails considerable cost and capacity to implement, the alternative is to engage an internet service provider to extend services down Mountain and Riverside roads, with the understanding that they may deploy wireless services in the future. Further community engagement is recommended to determine which option should be pursued.”
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O’Riordan said Thetis Island is served by outdated Telus infrastructure, fixed wireless, and satellite services, and applications for funding to serve the island have been submitted to senior levels of government.
He said Penelakut Island has had a recent Telus fibre build-out completed, but residents still report poor connectivity and concerns around affordability of services.
O’Riordan said cellular service was identified as a concern for both islands.
“The recommendations are to support the existing funding applications for fibre service on Thetis Island, and obtain a third-party assessment of the fibre infrastructure and services on Penelakut Island to identify issues causing poor connectivity,” he said.
“As well, options should be investigated for Penelakut Tribe to provide internet service to its members as a utility in order to address affordability, and facilitate discussions with cellular-service providers to address coverage gaps on both islands.”
At the committee of the whole meeting, North Cowichan director Tek Manhas said that cell towers were planned in a number of areas — including Cowichan Bay, Maple Bay and the City of Duncan — that were opposed by many in these communities and respective councils voted against them.
“I don’t know how we’re going to get around this,” he said.
John George, a consultant with the IBI Group, acknowledged there are challenges in deploying new cell towers in the CVRD.
“One of the things we were thinking of with the siting policies would be to encourage service providers to fill up their towers by sharing them with other service providers before building new towers,” George said.
“It will be critical to go out and communicate appropriately with the community to garner community support before embarking too far down the road on any one tactic.”
The committee voted that the recommendations be endorsed and advanced as staff resources and priorities allow.