The city of Chicago has answered 134 questions submitted by prospective respondents to the Broadband Infrastructure Expansion RFI, whose goal is to get private firms to use the city’s existing wired broadband infrastructure, city-owned facilities and parks to improve wired and wireless broadband service to the city’s residents and businesses. I reviewed the Q&A and [...]
Chicago has once again extended the deadline for responding to the Broadband Infrastructure Expansion RFI. The new deadline is 19 November 2012. The date of the Pre-Submittal Conference has also been changed. It is now 26 October 2012 at 2PM Central Time in Room 1103A, City Hall, 121 N. LaSalle Street, Chicago, Illinois. All interested [...]
Gigabit Squared to collaborate with State of Illinois, University of Chicago, and local communities to build Gigabit-speed broadband network Illinois Governor Pat Quinn has announced that Gigabit Squared is the recipient of an Illinois Gigabit Communities Challenge award. Illinois’ investment of $2 million will help support Gigabit Squared’s nationally renowned Gigabit Neighborhood Gateway Program (GNGP) [...]
Chicago has extended the deadline for responding to the RFI for broadband infrastructure expansion. The new deadline is 19 November 2012 (extended from 31 October 2012). It has also released an Addendum to the RFI, which you should download if you wish to respond. As I mentioned before, Chicago has 3 goals: – create an [...]
Seattle has decided to lease more of its fiber to broadband providers to improve the quality of broadband in the city: “Residents and businesses have been complaining about slow Internet and thus, the city responded with this new plan. Opening up the fiber network to private companies should increase internet speeds and allow for competition between [...]
90 percent of Kansas City neighborhoods sign up for Google fiber: 180 out of the 202 “fiberhoods” in Kansas City have met the minimum number of residents (who preregistered and paid a small fee) required for Google to come in and deliver FTTH service. I would say that’s a success. (Ars Technica) Broadcom includes community [...]
Singapore OpenNet’s fiber subscriber base crossed the 200,000 mark in August 2012, doubling in only 8 months since hitting the 100,000 mark in January 2012. Delays in installing FTTH connections plagued OpenNet in 2011 because demand for FTTH subscriptions exceeded the speed with which they could connect households and businesses to the network. Fiber connections [...]
In working across the globe and working with multiple carriers deploying new, more robust broadband networks, Strategic Networks Group consistently comes up against the notion that once the network is built, adoption will naturally follow. “Build it and they will come” is a school of thought that expresses the great hope that potential subscribers will [...]
Communities should roll out and own their broadband networks Sascha Meinrath, long-time contributor to MuniWireless and frequent speaker at our conferences, has written an article with Christopher Mitchell, entitled “Want to Pay Less and Get More” about how the model of community-owned broadband networks allow people to pay less money for better and faster broadband service, [...]
Google’s fiber network in Kansas City is getting all the press these days, but did you know that the first city in America to offer 1 Gig Internet service is Chattanooga, Tennessee? Chattanooga’s community-owned electric utility, EPB, has deployed a fiber optic network and it already sells triple-play service (Internet + TV + phone) or [...]
