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Show 1 Jl' 1 ! : A - t ' 0 ' i i J "a i i; -av- . j i Lrf-L I f" f l - . vs,t 1 ' h ' " ,. I s ! s- s , v I i V N " SERVES SOUTH DAVIS COUNTY Telephone service additions in Farmington.Centervilleand Bountiful will be made in 1983 at a cost of nearly $300,000, according to W. Mack Lawrence, Lawr-ence, Mountain Bell-Utah vice president. "WE WILL be installing buried cable in the Farminton area along Highway 106 to Jet. 89 and Shephard Lane and also have a project planned on Clark Lane," Mr. Lawrence said. Various cable jobs are approved in the Bountiful area, including buried cable on 1100 West between 500-1500 South; Willow Farm Estates; Porter Lane and along Main Street. NEARLY $40,000 will be spent in the three areas to install in-stall additional central office equipment needed to handle the growth in local and long distance calling, according to Mr. Lawrence. For Mountain Bell's operation opera-tion on a statewide basis, the past year will be remembered as a year that was filled with change and transition. This year promises to follow suit as the company moves toward January 1, 1984, a date that will be recorded in history books marking the biggest change in telecommunications history --the --the divestiture of the Bell Operating Companies from the parent company - AT&T. MR. LAWRENCE said the next few years will be an exciting excit-ing time for the telecommunications telecommuni-cations industry. "We are entering en-tering a new era that is full of challenges and opportunities. Our customers have more choices available to them and Equipment costing an estimated $40,000 will be needed to provide additional long distance and local telephone service ser-vice to residents of south Davis County. An additional $250,000 will be needed to install lines in Bountiful, Centerville and Farmington, according to W. Mack Lawrence, vice president of Mountain Bell Telphone in Utah. our industry has been given the latitude to 'try its wings' in a competitive world." The telephone industry in Utah feels that there is strong evidence that the long-awaited economic recovery is at hand. Mr. Lawrence said Mountain Moun-tain Bell plans to proceed with its construction projects this year with a positive outlook as it prepares to spend $ 1 28.6 mil-, mil-, lion throughout the state. "THE COST of providing telephone service increases each year. In 1973, for example, exam-ple, our construction budget totaled $63.6 million-less than half the amount we will be spending in Utah this year. Even as the investment increases, in-creases, the percentage of a retired re-tired worker's monthly Social Security check that goes to paying the phone bill continues to decrease," he said, pointing out that this amount has declined de-clined 41.5 percent between 1971 and 1981. The money allocated in the 1983 construction budget is divided di-vided among four basic cate-gories. cate-gories. Those categories, categor-ies, and the amount that will be spend for each, include: 1. Growth -- $86.0 million; 2. Modernization $23.6 million; mil-lion; 3. Customer Movement --$14.4 --$14.4 million; 4. Replacement of Obsolete Equipment - $4.6 million. "INCLUDED LN the $128.6 million budget this year is more than $7.5 million to provide pro-vide Electronic Switching (ESS) offices in service in Utah. At the end of this year, approximately 61 percent of our customers will be served by this modern equipment. "WE FEEL this is very significant sig-nificant because ESS service is the most reliable, convenient and flexible telephone service available," Mr. Lawrence commented. Electronic Switching equipment equip-ment makes it possible for customers cus-tomers to have optional features fea-tures such as Call Waiting, Speed Calling, Three-Way Calling and Call Forwarding. Because the system is electronic, electro-nic, as opposed to electromechanical, elec-tromechanical, calls are connected con-nected rapidly, with some calls ringing even as the last number is being depressed. "THE ESS conversion in our South Salt Lake central office will take place in July. This is a significant one for us because it not only represents the largest cutover at one time in Utah, but is also one of the largest cuts in the entire Bell System," he said. This $17.75 million project began in November of 1981 and involves teamwork from several Mountain Bell departments depart-ments to coordinate the massive mas-sive changes involved in a conversion con-version of this size. When the cut is completed, nearly 45,000 South Salt Lake customers will benefit from thir new, modernized service, Lawrence Lawr-ence said. "They will notice a small change in the dial tone, and a big improvement in the speed with which their calls are processed," he added. THE CLEARFIELD area will be converted to this new type of service next month at a cost of approximately $9.7 million, mil-lion, with 4,000 man-hours involved. in-volved. This office will serve 21,500 customers, Mr. Lawrence Lawr-ence concluded. |