Case study: a 30,000 ha game reserve, three lodges, one owned backbone

The situation before

• Property: 30,000-hectare private game reserve in South Africa, three lodges, remote gates, staff housing and patrol routes.
• Connectivity: a consumer-grade wireless service delivering roughly 3 Mbps down to the main lodge; the outlying lodges were effectively offline.
• Operational cost: the provider was on site every day swapping equipment to keep the link alive. Guests complained, reservations and card payments failed, and management had no live view of cameras or gates.
• Risk: security and anti-poaching cameras could not be backhauled; ranger and lodge teams could not reliably communicate; every outage became a vehicle trip.

What CTTX built

• Backhaul: a carrier-backed 100 Mbps fully symmetrical circuit terminated at a main mast serving the main lodge.
• Backbone: two solar-powered relay masts on surveyed high-sites extending carrier-grade point-to-point links to the outlying lodges — over 800 Mbps measured on the reserve backbone.
• Power and protection: solar with lithium backup, stainless vandal-resistant cabinets, remote monitoring of every site.
• Design method: terrain profiling and line-of-sight modelling before any steel went up; mast heights and radio selection engineered for Fresnel-zone clearance, not guessed.

Results

• 3 Mbps → 100 Mbps symmetrical into the property; 800+ Mbps on the backbone.
• Daily → zero provider site visits since go-live.
• Guests stream HD sport at every lodge; reservations, VoIP and ranger comms run on the same backbone.
• Security camera and gate backhaul now possible across the property — the network became an operational platform, not just a guest-WiFi feed.
• The owner's verdict: they stopped doing speed tests.

Cost of disconnection vs value of connected operations

Measured only as an internet bill, the old link was cheap. Measured as an operation, it was expensive: daily technician visits, failed payments, unhappy guests, blind cameras and rangers without comms. The engineered backbone is an owned asset that keeps absorbing new systems — cameras, sensors, gate controllers, water telemetry, staff comms — so its return improves every year. That is the difference between renting disconnected services and owning strategic infrastructure.

Common questions

How much bandwidth does a game reserve need?

A multi-lodge reserve typically needs a 50–100 Mbps symmetrical backhaul into the property and a backbone of several hundred Mbps between lodges so that guest WiFi, reservations, VoIP, ranger comms and security cameras never compete. On this reserve CTTX delivered 100 Mbps symmetrical backhaul and measured over 800 Mbps on the on-reserve backbone.

How is a reserve wireless network powered when there is no grid?

Each relay high-site runs on solar with lithium battery backup in a stainless, vandal-resistant cabinet, and is remotely monitored, so the backbone stays up through load-shedding and is checked without a vehicle trip.

How long does a reserve backbone take to deploy?

After the site survey and terrain/line-of-sight design, a three-lodge backbone of this size is typically built in a few weeks. The site survey costs R3,500 excl. VAT and is credited back if the build proceeds.

Does the reserve own the infrastructure?

Yes. The masts, radios, power and cabinets are the reserve's asset. The backhaul service is a carrier-backed circuit; everything on the property is owned infrastructure that keeps supporting new systems — cameras, sensors, gates, telemetry — as the operation grows.

Is your reserve in the same position?

Send us the reserve name or GPS position and what the network must carry. We come back with a terrain-aware pre-assessment before anyone drives out. Email sales@cttx.co.za or call 041 371 1089.