[waterlesscloud]

A number of different factors at play.

Imagine a layout where cables do not have to follow roads.

Imagine a layout where one cable can serve buildings on two roads. Certainly much, much easier when the buildings are dense.

Imagine a thousand people living in one building in the center of a thousand square miles, served by one cable. Imagine a thousand people living one per square mile in a thousand square miles. The population densities are the same. The cabling costs are not.

[zzuser]

Imagination will take you very far, and in this case, very far from the matter at hand. Texas and Finland are real places, not figments of imagination.

> Imagine a layout where cables do not have to follow roads. Imagine a layout where one cable can serve buildings on two roads. Certainly much, much easier when the buildings are dense.

Not very likely in the real world. Easements and rights of way are not available or not readily available among arbitrary paths. In any case, even if you were to cut through peoples back yards, you would still most of the time just be following a parallellish path to the roads.

> Imagine a thousand people living in one building in the center of a thousand square miles, served by one cable. Imagine a thousand people living one per square mile in a thousand square miles. The population densities are the same. The cabling costs are not.

These are real places we are talking about. Have a look at a map.