[xkemp]

> A single pipe can only handle so many providers

A single pipe can handle only so many customers. I don't see how it limits the number of providers?

There actually are countriess with such rules, and they seem to work well. The difficult part is the need to set some uniform price providers must pay for that "last mile" connection to their customer. I seem to remember something like $8/month in Germany. That's actually low enough, it would allow healthy competition even if you set wholesale price 50% higher than neccessary.

The same mechanism is used for competition among power and natural gas companies.

[snisarenko]

I guess you are right. You can really put as many "providers" on a pipe as you want. But are they really providers from a competition standpoint, or just the same pipe with a different logo?

The problem is that they can't compete on price (in the downwards direction), and they can't compete on building new infra with latest technology. The minimum price is established by the price the owner of the pipes charges. Which is usually set by the gov't. So the can only compete on value added services (i.e. hey we are not going to sell your data hooray!)

The core competition we want in local infrastructure is faster internet and cheaper prices. I think the dual bid system can accomplish that (i.e. separate bids on building/upgrading infra, and bids on maintenance/support)

As for gas and electricity, I think a similar bid system would work as well.