actually FIOS is already in certain parts of Largo, Seminole, Northern Pinellas, South St. Petersburg(Downtown Area/Old Northeast areas). They are laying fiber right now for residential services to condo towers, it is already here in a lot of pockets of Pinellas it seems. 33701 which is the downtown area and surrounding neighborhoods is one of them....the people on the phone, salesman, those moving truck ads around south St. Petersburg. I wonder if they are going to work south and north and then meet in the middle, it seems anyway. The demographics in the center of the county are probably less appealing as according to cable companies that they want to do middle class and lower last...data isn't even needed, look at all the outside tv antennas around the Clearwater area. Most of it is middle class, something Verizon doesn't seem to have a priority for right now. As for Pasco, Southeast Hillsborough, most of that was new construction opportunity...the others like South Tampa, Tampa, New Tampa, Manatee and south is obviously targeted towards upper-middle like cable companies claim.
I don't mean to be rude but you are totally wrong on so many levels.
First of all, if they are servicing downtown St. Pete with Verizon FIOS in any address, even the Parkshore Tower or other new condo projects, that is a good sign, but I have seen no signs of this. They are working their way down from Clearwater. Their current ads for our area, are bundles of Verizon phone over copper, DSL for broadband, and DirecTV for television. No FIOS TV down here yet. But I am not going to argue that point. Let's assume you are right and part of downtown is covered.
My real problem with your discussion is your demographics. While it is obvious, they would want to do wealthier neighborhoods and new construction first, you are wrong about why they are doing where or not doing somewhere else. The myth by outsiders of St. Petersburg is that it is scummy and low class. Like any city, there are bad areas. The south side had riots in 1996, second only to LA earlier that decade. They had a corrupt police chief for a while that made things worse. Having that said, the low to lower middle class areas you speak of are in every city. In St. Pete they are mainly in the "midtown" area of the south side. Believe me. I know first hand the wealth in this city. There are a lot of very wealthy areas in St. Petersburg and I know them all. This misconception needs to be put to bed. St. Pete is not all scummy and cheap. I service residential customers (and businesses) in this city and there are plenty of people that would go for Verizon FIOS.
Manatee= upper middle class? Have you ever been to Manatee County? Head south from St. Pete over the Skyway. You'll find some nice homes on the north end of the county, to the east and west (beaches), but you will find some real low class stuff outweighing all that when you enter Palmetto and Bradenton. Look at the migrant worker housing just before you cross the bridge into Bradenton. I'll bet they were the first to jump onto FIOS.
The real reason Verizon spread the way it did dates back to their master plan which was designed before the state changed the cable franchise laws. It used to be that a provider had to come up with an agreement with each municipality they went into. Early on they fought with Tampa and were welcomed by Temple Terrace. Can you imagine them starting out in Pinellas County, which has like 26 municipalities? (Hillsborough only has three- Tampa, Temple Terrace, Plant City) That would be a nightmare fighting with all those cities. Now the law has changed and they have their franchise agreement with the state. So they can roll right into Pinellas as fast as they can build it out. It was however, already mapped out years ago that they would work their way down from north to south Pinellas County. I don't believe they are servicing anything downtown and working their way up to the teams working their way down in Clearwater.
Edit- I forgot to mention that in Pasco, my mother lives in a non-new construction neighborhood and she has had the service for well over a year. My sister in-law (god bless her) lived in a very low class neighborhood and they had the service from Jan of this year until they broke up and abandoned their house (and their contract). My father-in-law in Pasco is able to get the service and he is out in the stix. So Pasco was not built out based soley on new construction. It was just part of their expansion plan. Not only that, one thing I forgot to mention too is that Pinellas already has two providers (BHN and Knology). Knology was actually Verizon Americast and they sold it off some years ago. So they will be the third cable provider in St. Pete. That may play into their expansion plans too. One last thing... keep in mind that Pinellas County is the most densely populated county in the state of Florida, meaning there are more people per square mile than Miami-Dade or anywhere else.
