Opinion ID: 785238
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Route-specific analysis of dedicated transport

Text: 70 In USTA I we expressed skepticism regarding whether there could be impairment in markets where the element in question — though not literally ubiquitous — is significantly deployed on a competitive basis, giving as a specific example interoffice dedicated transport. 290 F.3d at 422. We also instructed the Commission, as noted above, to apply a nuanced concept of impairment connected to specific markets or market categories. Id. at 426. Any process of inferring impairment (or its absence) from levels of deployment depends on a sensible definition of the markets in which deployment is counted. 71 For dedicated transport elements the Commission decided that the appropriate market was not a geographic market (e.g., a Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), as the ILECs urged, or general customer class), but rather a specific point-to-point route. Thus, for example, the fact that dedicated transport facilities are widely deployed within one MSA does not, in the Commission's view, necessarily preclude a finding of impairment between two specific points within that MSA, if deployment has not satisfied the Commission's competitive triggers on that route. 72 We do not see how the Commission can simply ignore facilities deployment along similar routes when assessing impairment. Suppose points A, B, and C are all in the same geographic market and are similarly situated with regard to the barriers to entry that the Commission says are controlling. See Order ¶¶ 84 et seq. Suppose further that multiple competitors supply DS1 transport between points A and B, but only the ILEC and one other CLEC have deployed DS1 transport between A and C. The Commission cannot ignore the A-B facilities deployment when deciding whether CLECs are impaired with respect to A-C deployment without a good reason. The Commission does explain why competition on the A-B route should not be sufficient to establish competition is possible on the A-C route, Order ¶ 401, but this cannot explain the Commission's implicit decision to treat competition on one route as irrelevant to the existence of impairment on the other. Nor does the Commission explain whether, and why, the error costs (both false positives and false negatives) associated with a route-by-route market definition are likely to be lower than the error costs associated with alternative market definitions. While it may be infeasible to define the barriers to entry in a manageable form, i.e., in such a way that they may usefully be applied to MSAs (or other plausible markets) as a whole, the Commission nowhere suggests that it explored such alternatives, much less found them defective. 73