CITY OF VANCOUVER

ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT

 

Date:

March 1, 2004

 

Author:

Martin Crocker

 

Phone No.:

604.873.7647

 

RTS No.:

03957

 

CC File No.:

8109

 

Meeting Date:

March 23, 2004

TO:

Vancouver City Council

FROM:

Director of Information Technology

SUBJECT:

Agreement with Vancouver Port Authority to Exchange Use of Optical Fibre Networks

RECOMMENDATION

GENERAL MANAGER'S COMMENTS

The General Manager of Corporate Services RECOMMENDS approval.

COUNCIL POLICY

Execution of legal agreements by the Director of Legal Services and General Manager of Engineering Services with respect to access to City streets requires Council approval.
On July 30, 1996, when dealing with a report on Telecommunications Policies, Council approved a number of goals including one to ensure that the City maintains its authority to regulate equitable access to rights-of-way, secure valuable compensation for their use, minimize negative impacts associated with their use, and utilize them in a manner that furthers other telecommunications policy objectives.

PURPOSE

The City and the Vancouver Port Authority (VPA) have parallel optical fibre data networks between the vicinity of Canada Place and the E-Comm facility. Providing each with the use of a limited number of the other's optical fibres minimizes the risk to both organizations of a single network failure impacting the accessibility of core information systems.

The purpose of this report is to ask Council to approve the City negotiating, executing and delivering a limited fibre-sharing agreement with VPA.

BACKGROUND

Optical fibre is the high-speed telecommunications medium of choice, with capacity far in excess of either conventional copper lines or wireless links. A typical configuration consists of silica fibres bonded together in ribbons of 6 fibres, with between 1 and 72 ribbons bundled into a protective sheath to form a cable of between 10 mm and 25 mm in diameter. In general, a pair of fibres is needed for each data connection.

The VPA has existing optical fibre running east-west along the south shore of Burrard Inlet, providing telecommunications services for data and security applications.

The City, through its duct licence agreements with Urban Networks Inc. (initially approved by Council on January 22, 2002 and an extension approved by Council on Feb 24, 2004), has an optical fibre network which includes a 48-fibre segment running east-west along Hastings Street from E-Comm through the downtown core.

In mid-2003, City staff asked VPA to consider an arrangement that was basically a fibre swap; it would provide the City with the use of a limited number of VPA fibres, and VPA with the use of the same number of City fibres. A common interest was identified, discussions continued, and an agreement in principle has been reached.

DISCUSSION

The City's core information and communication systems are located in the E-Comm facility to take advantage of its "hardening" against a variety of threats. These systems currently include e-mail, SAP, Internet/intranet, GIS, property document management and file storage. The long-term goal is that all systems will be located at this data centre, with a backup data centre at the Chess Street Fire Training Centre.

In order for staff (and the public, in some cases) to use these systems, data connectivity is needed. At present, a single optical fibre cable provides connectivity to the E-Comm data centre. This cable has redundant fibre pairs within it, so that if one fibre of a pair fails, another pair automatically takes over. However, the greatest threats to this data connection are either from construction activity (e.g. a backhoe) or from a localized ground fault (e.g. an earthquake). In either of these situations, the whole cable is likely to be damaged and the internal redundancy would be inadequate to protect against loss of connectivity.

A better approach is to have fibre redundancy through geographically distinct paths, which the VPA optical fibre offers. Under this scenario, the primary route to E-Comm would be through City fibre, while the secondary route would be through VPA fibre, with the converse being the case for VPA.

The proposed agreement may be summarized as:

From the City's perspective, the benefits are significant:

From VPA's perspective, the benefits are also significant, offering:

A joint application to the MoTH for a permit to use the MoTH duct system for part of the north segment that runs up the McGill Street on-ramp has been approved.

ALTERNATIVES/OPTIONS

The City could lease telecommunications service from a commercial provider. Given the relatively high capacity required, the annual cost of such a leased service is estimated to be $60,000.

The City could also build an alternate fibre route, most probably south from E-Comm down Renfrew and west along 41st, where it would interconnect with a new fibre segment on Ontario St. While the City may consider this option in the future, costs are estimated at $20,000 - $40,000 on top of the $15,000 E-Comm - Cassiar duct build (which would still be needed for complete independence of routes), and the time to deploy would be considerably longer.

The arrangement with VPA is preferable to either of these alternatives.

FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

On May 14, 2002, Council approved the recommendation of a report titled "Improvement to Information Technology Business Continuity Capabilities". This report recommended relocation of the City's key information servers to E-Comm, and identified associated annual telecommunications costs of $50,000, of which $40,000 was for the backup connectivity that this report proposes through the fibre swap. Starting in 2003, this was included in the Information Technology operating budget, though not used.

The estimated $15,000 cost of this initiative can be funded from the 2004 operating budget.

A $40,000 annual reduction in the Information Technology budget is projected, subject to review of the 2005 operating budget.

CONCLUSION

The proposed agreement with VPA mitigates a risk of major service disruption at little cost to the City. It permits an operating budget reduction, and offers the potential of improved communication between the City, the VPA, E-Comm and the MoTH, to the public benefit.

It is recommended that Council approve that the General Manager of Corporate Services and the Director of Legal Services be authorized to conclude an agreement with VPA with the goal of exchanging these optical fibres as soon as possible.

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Appendix

CITY/VPA OPTICAL FIBRE ROUTES

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