Bruce Street is celebrating its 16th year in business and is excited for what the future has in store! As always, thank you for choosing Bruce Street as your internet and technology services provider.

Fibre Build Delays!

We have completed our fibre construction projects in Rocklyn and Slabtown and have many new rural customers who are now able to enjoy true high speed internet service! However, while Bruce Street had every intention of completing many more fibre builds in 2021, our efforts have been hampered by a number of factors.

Foremost, delays in obtaining Utility Locates has been the largest obstacle for construction projects, and not just for Bruce Street. Many companies and Municipalities have complained that their projects have been delayed as they cannot get Locates completed in a timely fashion. Normally, it would only take a matter of days to a couple of weeks to have this work done but we still have unfinished Locate requests dating back to March! Without locates, it is difficult to accurately map the running fibre lines, and without the proper mapping, we are unable to secure the necessary Municipal Consents. 

Regarding the Consents, there are some delays in this step of the process as well. While Bruce Street has an MAA (Municipal Access Agreement) in place with the Municipalities of Meaford and Blue Mountains, and with Grey County, we are still waiting for the MAA to be completed with Grey Highlands. Even where we have these Agreements in place, we still have to work with Municipal Staff to secure the Consents which can be time consuming based on their availability or individual requirements.

We are endeavoring to work with what permissions we have, and continue to prepare as much in advance as we possibly can for when these steps are met. It is ironic that the public and many levels of government have identified rural high speed internet as a major priority, yet there are so many roadblocks. The Ontario government has actually earmarked $4 billion towards making sure that EVERY resident will have access to 50/10 speeds by the end of 2025! While this is a lofty goal, there are many roadblocks that will make this very difficult including delays in funding allocations, Municipal Right-Of-Way access, equipment availability, etc.

We are excited and confident that we will be able to bring fibre to the area and will continue to push these projects forward as much as we are able and appreciate your patience.

Power Outage Issues Continue!

There still seems to be some confusion regarding why the internet service is out...even if you have power.

We understand that an outage, whether it is internet, television, phone or hydro service, is an inconvenience. However, it is often beyond the control of the provider and is just as frustrating for us as we have to identify the issue, locate the source of the problem, dispatch staff to assess and repair it, relay the information to the customer, and do all of this as soon as possible.

We recently experienced more local hydro outages which again impacted some of our access points that provide service to different regions in our coverage area. It is important to know that if you experience an outage of your Bruce Street internet service, you will often know before we do that there is an issue. While we monitor our network, interruptions can occur for a wide variety of reasons and they are not always immediately apparent. Our network is reliant upon a series of access points that connect our primary feeds and the equipment located at your home. These networks can be interrupted in many ways:

Hydro Outage - it is not uncommon for parts of our network to be down due to power outages throughout our area. If your hydro is out, your internet service will be out as well. However, your hydro can be up and your internet still be down because the power to our access point that services your area is out. We do have an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) at our access points but they are only capable of providing backup power for limited periods of time. Accordingly, we are dependent on the hydro service to be restored before we can reinitiate the service. Please note: after the service has been restarted, you may need to reboot your internal equipment.

Equipment Failure - there is no perfect machine. It doesn't matter if it is a multi-billion dollar corporation or a small local provider, we all suffer mechanical breakdowns from time to time. This can be localized to your captive equipment, or it can happen at a major plant serving immense areas. While we maintain our equipment regularly, there will always be equipment failures, cable breaks, lightning strikes, etc. For example, rodents love to chew on cables, and insects like to live inside electronic equipment. If your internet service is down, we ask that you check to ensure the equipment at your location is working properly first....is your device connecting to the router/modem; are the router/modem lights showing an internet connection; if you can access it, are the lights of the outside radio on, have you rebooted your equipment? If after checking, you are still without service, please contact us to determine whether it is an external issue. 

Service Source Interruption - Like you, Bruce Street also purchases its internet service. Ours just costs a lot more. Both our rural and urban services rely on our providers feeding our network. Like our own access points, there can be  service interruptions that occur well outside of our region that will negatively impact our service delivery. These are normally widespread failures and all companies involved will be prioritizing repairs as soon as possible. Our Atop TV service was also down recently, which we did not know until a customer called asking why it was not working. Upon investigation, we discovered that there was a large power outage in Markham which is where the Atop main trunk line is located. Accordingly, the tv service continued to be down until the power was restored hours later.

Whenever one of our services are out, we receive a number of calls...some curious, some understanding, some downright angry and rude. Whatever the disruption may be, please do not assume that we are aware of it. Please let us know and we will work with you to identify, and if it is within our power, repair the issue as soon as possible. If it is a large interruption affecting many customers, it is not possible to phone everyone individually so we will try to send an email to advise what the issue is. We realize that some people may not have access to email if their internet service is down but many will still be able to check through their data plans.

There seems to be a lot of outages this summer and whether it is related to infrastructure, climate change creating more severe weather, physical accidents such as hydro poles being hit, we are all subject to the subsequent impact. We ask that you be patient and thank you for your understanding while we try to determine and repair the service.

Rural Fibre
Internet Service

Can't get fast reliable internet service in
your rural environment?

Bruce Street is now installing fibre optic cable in rural locations throughout the municipalities of Grey Highlands, Meaford and the Town of The Blue Mountains!

Ask when this exciting new high speed service will be available in your area.

Streaming
Television

Tired of overpaying for cable or satellite television options? Consider streaming IPTV as an affordable alternative. Atop TV offers more flexibility in choosing channels and packages at a fraction of the price. Available as an app that can be downloaded and played on an Amazon Firestick, Roku or Apple TV device.

Bruce Street Technologies newsletter is a regular publication that will include important information such as package introductions or changes, new access point announcements, and other topics of interest regarding our services. If you do not wish to receive this information, you can opt out by clicking on the "unsubscribe from this list" link at the bottom of the newsletter.