This falls squarely into the "What were they thinking?" category. USA Today has an article in today's paper about the Hubble space telescope, which is now relatively old and needs upgrades and repairs. Yet NASA and its "high tech" contractors built many parts of the device in a way that makes it almost impossible to repair or upgrade in space!!
So they are designing and building a SPACE-based device and never thought to ask themselves, "How will this be fixed or upgraded?" Just an example of why it is so important to do due diligence with technology vendors. The fact that they are building high tech equipment does not mean they know what they are doing. This is especially true with communitywide broadband systems. Many vendors are simply selling repurposed corporate and institutional network gear that may work okay for small and pilot community projects, but the stuff does not scale up well to support multiple service providers or thousands of subscribers. You have to take the time to check out vendors and their promises (Disclaimer: Design Nine helps communities do just this--we make sure the hardware and systems you are buying fit the job).