Google Fiber has begun taking signups in Louisville, Kentucky, after a tumultuous process involving lawsuits filed against the local government by incumbent broadband providers.

AT&T and Charter both sued the metro government in Louisville and Jefferson County last year in an attempt to stop a new ordinance designed to give Google Fiber easier access to utility poles.

The lawsuits haven't stopped the new ordinance, as AT&T's was thrown out of court and Charter's is still pending. But instead of hanging wires on utility poles, Google Fiber ended up burying the cables with a "microtrenching" strategy that is quicker than traditional underground fiber deployment.

While it has been more than two years since Google Fiber announced that it would build in Louisville, it has only been a few months since construction began. "Louisville is the fastest we’ve ever moved from construction announcement, which happened in May, to signing up customers," a Google Fiber executive wrote in an announcement yesterday.

Residents in the Portland, Strathmoor and Newburg neighborhoods of Louisville can now sign up for service. Google Fiber is also providing a gigabit connection at the Neighborhood House, a community center for children and families living in poverty.

Less disruptive digging

Microtrenching is used by Google Fiber and other companies to install fiber without making giant holes in the ground. Instead of a foot-wide trench, a microtrench is about an inch wide and four inches deep.

"Google Fiber hasn't needed to touch any utility poles in Louisville yet," according to an article in TechRepublic. "In the first three pockets of the city where it's deployed, it's relied on shallow trenching to execute its fiber-to-the-premises plans. In fact, shallow trenching is going so well in Louisville that Google Fiber hasn't yet had to use the fixed wireless technology that it acquired from Webpass."

Google Fiber's announcement mentioned Louisville's friendly pole access regime, suggesting that the ISP will still make use of utility poles. Louisville's One Touch Make Ready ordinance lets new entrants like Google Fiber make all of the necessary wire adjustments on utility poles instead of having to wait for incumbent providers to send work crews to move their own wires. But microtrenching is apparently still faster than getting access to poles.

"As we continue construction across the city, we’ll bring our service to more Louisville residents and neighborhoods," Pluta wrote.

Times are still tough for Google Fiber, which cut its staff and ended operations in some cities a year ago. One change designed to turn things around is a shift away from traditional pay-TV packages. Louisville is among the first Google Fiber cities where only Internet access is available, though customers can also sign up for Google's YouTube TV streaming service, which is available over any Internet connection.

The plans available in Louisville are $50 a month for 100Mbps download and upload speeds and $70 a month for 1Gbpbs. Both plans come with unlimited data, and the gigabit offering includes 1TB of cloud storage.

Disclosure: The Advance/Newhouse Partnership, which owns about 13 percent of Charter, is part of Advance Publications. Advance Publications owns Condé Nast, which owns Ars Technica.