Company to lay fiber optic cable through Marble Hill

MARBLE HILL, Mo. -- Sho-Me Technologies of Marshfield, Mo., has contracted to lay fiber-optic cables in Marble Hill sometime in the next three weeks.

Sho-Me Technologies is a subsidiary of Sho-Me Power Electric Cooperative in Marshfield. It does not provide cellphone service or Internet connections, company spokesman Tim Lewis said, but it provides the technology that enables other providers to hook up their customers.

Project engineer Eric Wutke said Sho-Me employees will bore under the streets to lay the underground line. The line will connect from work going on south of Highway 51 northward into town, will go down Second Street, Englehart Lane, then head north on Main Street to the junction of highways 51 and 34, then head east on Highway 34 out of town.

They will be installing a 1 1/2-inch fiber optic flex conduit, Wutke said. The fiber optics will go inside the conduit they are installing. Ten to 15 people will be working, and there is expected to be no disruption of traffic.

"Sho-Me Technologies has contracted with several different construction companies to build these routes due to the time frame in which it needed to be built," Lewis said. Ervin Construction and Floyd's Equipment will be building in the Marble Hill area, he said.

The project here is a segment of the company's statewide network.

"We have 2,500 miles in southern Missouri except for Southeast Missouri," Lewis said.

According to information Lewis provided, the expansion will be done in two phases with a total distance of 700 miles. The fiber optic route will be used as a "backbone" network for a high-capacity cellular network.

"As we build our points of presence, or POPs, we will be able to start offering services along this route," Lewis said.

The first phase will be completed this year, and the second phase will be completed by the middle of 2013.

Pertinent address:

Marble Hill, MO