[yk]

The problem with burying cables is, that the first mover advantage can not be overcome. The calculation of the first guy is, that he has some cost X for N subscribers who will have to pay a monopoly rate M. The calculation of the second guy is, he has to pay X to bury a cable to capture some fraction of the subscribers fN who each pay a competitive subscription rate C much smaller than M. (In fact close to the marginal cost of an additional subscriber, that is basically 0). So the first guy expects to break even after X/(MN) and the second guy at X/(CfN).

This suggests the interesting possibility, that it may be worthwhile for the neighbors in a street to build their own cable and just give it to a competitor of the cable provider.