A ship feeding fiber optic cable connecting the United States with Southeast Asia anchors off Longfellow Avenue in Hermosa Beach Monday. Photo by Ryan McDonald
by Ryan McDonald
Is it an oil tanker? A Navy boat? A cargo ship? And what is it doing so close to shore?
Joggers, cyclists, and surfers all took turns craning their necks this week, as a ship helped undersea fiber optic cable spanning the Pacific Ocean finish the final yards of its journey in North Hermosa Beach.
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In 2016, the Hermosa Beach City Council agreed to a deal that will bring four cables from East Asia to the U.S. mainland. Two come ashore at 25th Street, where a similar ship appeared offshore last year, and two more arrive via Longfellow Avenue, which was closed to traffic west of Manhattan Avenue starting last week to allow for the construction necessary to receive the cables.
Hermosa has become a preferred landing destination for the cables. Along with its proximity to business hubs in Los Angeles, the city owns its beach, which makes for fewer administrative hoops to jump through than in cities where the beach is owned by Los Angeles County, such as in Manhattan Beach. The 2016 cable deal follows a previous agreement that the city made in 2002, which brought cables ashore at 2nd Street.
In return for serving as the site where the cables come ashore, Hermosa is paid handsomely. In exchange for granting the cable companies an easement over city property, the 2016 deal provided a one-time payment of $1.1 million, and annual payments of $300,000 per year. Because the money is produced in part through infrastructure passing through tidelands, state law requires that some of it be dedicated toward coastal infrastructure accessible to the broader public.
The cables will travel underground east toward the Greenbelt, then join up with a substation at Pacific Coast Highway. Once installed, the cables leave no visible infrastructure at street level. And although the cables travel along the seabed for much of their journey, they are buried underneath the seafloor starting about 2,500 feet from the shoreline, and continue underground along the beach.
2019-12-07 09:01:15Z
https://easyreadernews.com/ship-brings-cable-and-cash-to-city/
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