An MTS crew works on a fibre installation in Steinbach

Some Steinbach residents are waking up to an unwelcome sight - MTS crews digging up their front yards.  

It's part of the company's $125 million dollar accelerated fibre deployment plan, also known as fibre-to-the-home network (FiON).  Gillian Potvin is a spokesperson for MTS and she says crews are installing fibre lines in two different ways.

"It'll either be deployed aerial or buried.  For aerial, they'll be securing the fibre onto hydro poles and run past resident's properties.  Buried will run under the ground into what will appear to be, a bit larger than a sprinkler box on a resident's property."

Potvin says the obvious preference for crews is one that results in the least amount of disruption to a person's yard.

"Our preference is to do it aerially but, of course there are some areas where hydro may be underground.  So, in those instances, we will run it under the ground but, we try to do it in the most non-destructive way to a resident's property."

The eventual goal is to have the entire city provided with access to the wide array of MTS services, but Potvin says that won't happen until next year.

"Right now we expect that TV service will be available to approximately 30% of the community at launch later this year.  Our plan is to deploy it to the entire city sometime in 2012."

According to a previous release, the fibre upgrade will give residents access to next-generation high-definition television and the fastest broadband connections available with connection speeds up to 25 Mbps anbd potential future speeds of over 100 Mbps.  The deployment plan will make its Ultimate TV service available to an additional 120,000 homes in close to 20 Manitoba communities.  The service is already available to 95% of Winnipeg households as well as in Brandon, Portage La Prairie and parts of Selkirk.

So, what took them so long to come to Steinbach?

"It's a fairly extensive process to go in and do the surveying and deploy the fibre throughout the community.  But, in the long run it means better services, MTS TV for customers, faster internet speeds into the future.  It's really a great network to be a part of."

For more information on the MTS FiON, check out www.mts.ca/fion.