Dear Tombigbee Members and Tombigbee Fiber Customers:
While we paused yesterday to celebrate 246 years of our American Independence, we also reflected on the progress of our project to Bring Your Fiber to You! We are proud to have recently announced that Phase 2 is now complete. Phase 2 commenced and ended on schedule, June of 2021 to June of 2022. We have built and activated 2,270 miles of fiber so far! That means that 33,637 of Tombigbee Electric’s members now have gigabit internet available at their homes and businesses. Phase 3 construction began three and a half months earlier than planned and is progressing well to date.
As a reminder, a fiber project consists of the following steps: 1) design; 2) make ready engineering; 3) make ready construction; 4) setting of huts; 5) mainline construction; 6) splicing; 7) testing; 8) activation and installation. For our remaining Phases 3 and 4, steps 1, 2 and 4 are complete. Phase 3 consists of the eight remaining power feeder routes on the Tombigbee Electric system, namely the areas near Shannon, Nettleton and Fairview. Phase 4 will be the east half of Pontotoc Electric Power Association’s territory bounded essentially by Highway 15 to the west. At this time, make ready construction is winding down, with only a few areas remaining to be completed. Mainline construction is ongoing in seven of the eight Phase 3 areas, with splicing and testing commencing in several of them very soon. The summer will bring service activation to most of the Phase 3 areas with fall brining the rest online. If you follow us on social media, you have seen systematic activation of service area after service area recently, resulting in us bringing Your Fiber to You! This will continue until every member of Tombigbee has service available to them.
Between forty and fifty contractor construction crews work each day on this project. That means 200 to 300 workers are endeavoring daily to bring Your Fiber to You! We have 325 miles remaining to build on our system in Phase 3, with about 600 miles to build in Phase 4. As construction draws to completion in the individual areas of Phase 3, the construction miles remaining on Tombigbee’s Electric territory will shrink, and construction crews will begin building in Phase 4. The same is true of make ready construction. As Phase 3 make ready construction comes to an end, the make ready construction crews will move off system to do that step in Phase 4. As stated above, with the number of mainline construction crews on hand, we can work in six to eight areas at a time, with the various stages of construction. As such, when there are only three to four areas of construction remaining, we will divide our crews between Phase 3 and 4. Rest assured our steps and progress will continue such as to provide service to all of Phase 3, all of Tombigbee’s members, prior to service being made available in Phase 4. However, Phase 4 will begin to see significant construction efforts very soon.
As our project draws to a close, you will see an ongoing effort to have you and your neighbors choose Tombigbee Fiber! We hope to serve all Tombigbee members and our neighbors living in Phase 4. Our Service will set us apart. We pledge to you the highest level of quality of the fiber service and support. We will serve you in the name of community and in the spirit of excellence. We will do our best to bring you reliable, affordable world class fiber internet and VOIP telephone service. In the event that the service might be interrupted, our Red Truck Team will be there to get you back going! Additionally, as an example of our service, our packages include, without any additional pricing or charges, an APP, parental controls and ProtectIQ software among other services. We hope you take advantage of these services.
In conclusion, we ask your patience as we work diligently to complete our tasks. Our signups are approaching record highs. We ask your patience from signup through those last few days and weeks until we have you installed. We will accomplish our tasks. We will complete this project. We will get you installed and provide you the service you have been waiting for!
You can find out more specific information for your address on Tombigbeefiber.com.
Tombigbee Fiber, LLC
Scott R. Hendrix, CEO
