For a short time I worked for a guy that previously owned a construction company (among many past companies,) and he had taken on cable/fiber running jobs for the city. He took them on, because he was lucky and got a ridiculous deal on a particular piece of equipment. Turns out, at least in my state, and I assume others, you cannot trench dig the cable lines anymore. You need to tunnel, and that takes a machine that cost like $500k-1mil or more, and that the operation cost of it was really high because you needed a special operator and 1 or more other expensive bureaucratic inspections/insurance/auditors/surveyors etc. That was for running along public property though, so maybe they could trench on private. I think a laser network would be cheaper, at least for the short term, but having conduit underground would be much cheaper to upgrade. I have wanted to get a home in the hills for a long time, and always figured a laser network would be an good alternative option. Set up a clear line of sight from home to property edge and have the ISP run a cable to a shack right on the property line closest to their existing infrastructure. Or rent out space on a rooftop of a home/business to have the transceiver. They go up to a mile, are gig speed, and cost like 5-10k per transceiver. I figure you could convince people along a rural route to form their own tier 2 network.