Local access and transport area

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Local access and transport area (LATA) is a term used in U.S. telecommunications regulation. It represents a geographical area of the United States under the terms of "the Modification of Final Judgment (MFJ) entered by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in Civil Action number 82-0192 or any other geographic area designated as a LATA in the National Exchange Carrier Association, Inc. Tariff FCC No. 4."

Generally, a geographical area as defined by the preceding sentence represents an area within which a divested Regional Bell operating company (RBOC) is permitted to offer exchange telecommunications and exchange access services.

Note: Under the terms of the MFJ, the RBOCs are generally prohibited from providing services that originate in one LATA and terminate in another.

Source: from Federal Standard 1037C

LATA boundaries tend to be drawn around markets, and not necessarily along existing state, province, or even area code borders. Some LATAs cross over state boundaries, such as those for Chicago, Illinois, Portland, Oregon, and areas between Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. Area codes and LATAs do not necessarily share boundaries; many LATAs exist in multiple area codes, and many area codes exist in multiple LATAs.

Originally, the LATAs were grouped into regions within which one particular RBOC was allowed to provide services. The LATAs in each of these regions are numbered beginning with the same digit. Generally the LATAs were associated with carriers or other indications in the following manner:

Digit	Area/Use	RBOC
0xx	unused
1xx	New York & New England	NYNEX
2xx	Mid-Atlantic	Bell Atlantic
3xx	Great Lakes	Ameritech
4xx	Southeast	BellSouth
5xx	South-central	Southwestern Bell
6xx	Northwest, Midwest, and Rocky Mountains	US West
7xx	California and Nevada	Pacific Bell
8xx	Non-contiguous and international areas
9xx	Expansion

Since this time, however, some amount of deregulation, as well as a number of phone company mergers, have blurred the significance of these regions. A number of new LATAs have been formed within these regions since their inception, most beginning with the digit 9.

LATAs contribute to an often confusing aspect of long distance telephone service. Due to the various and overlapping regulatory limitations and inter-business arrangements, phone companies typically provide differing types of "long distance" service, each with potentially different rates:

within same LATA, within same state
within same LATA, between different states
between different LATAs, within same state
between different LATAs, between different states

Due to the general lack of understanding of the mechanics involved, many long distance companies do not explain the details of these different rates, which can lead to billing questions from surprised customers.

In order to facilitate the sharing of Telcordia telephone routing databases between countries, LATAs were later defined for the provinces of Canada, the other countries and territories of the North American Numbering Plan, and Mexico. Aside from U.S. territories, LATAs have no regulatory purpose in these areas. In 2000, the Canadian CRTC agency eliminated all Canadian provincial LATAs in favor of a single LATA for Canada (888).

Local access and transport area

From Free net encyclopedia

Contents

List of LATAs

U.S. state LATAs

U.S. territory LATAs

Non-U.S. LATAs (non-regulatory)

Notes

External links

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