There are a lot of folks on forums like this who think networks like FiOS should be regulated into being essentially dumb pipes. Verizon and their investors see some chance of this happening, and even if it didn't, it turns out there aren't a lot of "value added" services you can sell to consumers over a proprietary network; they just want the internet.

You can't make the margins as a "dumb pipe" that Verizon needs to justify the capital investment in FiOS. That's the long and the short of it. They had dreams of selling pay-per-view movies, video chat, and a dozen other applications over their network for big $$$. Instead they're fighting with Comcast over the same $120 in cable and internet bills, while Netflix, Google, and Apple build their high-margin businesses on VZ's fiber.

I wonder how many people honestly care about what internet provider they have? Do most people want FIOS? Or would more people prefer to have a much better connection on the phone/iPad?

On top of that, as was mentioned above, it's probably cheaper to update to LTE than it is to run fiber everywhere, and on top of that, it's probably worth more money to them on the $x/mo for LTE service since to add another customer in the area is trivial compared to FIOS.

I believe the FIOS demand wasn't high enough to justify the costs of expanding it any further.