There are some good answers to the question, and I will elaborate with a story and pictures, to help illustrate both the problem and the solution.

We lived in Tamsui, Taiwan back in 2014 , in a newly developed area that was full of mostly empty high rise condos. A majority of the infrastructure was new, including roads and the sewer system, and therefore they put most of the needed utilities underground. There were very few utility poles, but there were a lot of underground “vaults” covered by man hole covers and marked with Utility descriptions.

When starting new, that is not too difficult to do. And long term it could save the utilities a lot of money as there is less of a chance of damage, but there are other complications. While living in northern Thailand, during rainy season, we experienced some storms that completely saturated the ground, and without proper engineering, it would also flood any underground utility infrastructure. In addition, other than new industrial parks or residential developments, it isn’t practical to dig up existing roads in Thailand, so underground utilities aren’t really feasible in most cases.

The problem, from my perspective, seems related to documentation. And, it’s also the solution.

We moved into a house north of Chiang Mai which previously had DSL service. The old modem was still there hooked up, so we called the same company to have them activate service. I had designed and facilitated the installation of communications equipment for many years, and had much interaction with telco companies, so I thought it would be simple. A technician would bring out a new modem, verify the incoming service at the demarc on the side of the house was still good, then plug in the modem. However, that is not what happened.

One afternoon a truck with 4 guys showed up, with a very long bamboo ladder hanging over the cab. A young man with a clipboard verified they had the right house, then proceeded to run a new cable from somewhere near the main road by the neighborhood entrance to the side of the house. It took them a few hours, and when complete we had two cables running from the nearest utility pole to the side of the house, but still had to wait for someone else to bring out the modem…

In the states, telco companies have detailed maps of their cable plants, and can trace a path from a central office to the side of your house, thru all of those little green boxes you see on the side of the road. Unless it’s a new structure, there usually isn’t a need for new cable, because they have documentation of what is already there.

That is what appears to be lacking with some companies in some parts of Thailand. They don’t know what goes where, so each new order for service results in contractors pulling a new cable. Long term it seems less expensive to pay a telco technician to document the existing infrastructure, reusing what is already in place, rather that continuing to add new cable.

From what I have read, that is now being done. People are complaining about the huge masses of cable in front of their homes and businesses. So just give it a little time, it’s taken a lot of effort to make it like it is, and will just require some more time to fix it.