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Wireless Networking Government Politics Hardware

Municipal Wi-Fi - A Promise Unfulfilled? 137

Posted by Zonk from the problematic-adoption dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Jeff Merron at InformationWeek writes about the problems with municipal Wi-Fi, and how despite the high hopes of cities across the country there hasn't been much success deploying it in reality. He also examines the few successful applications of the technology, and tries to explore why more projects don't make it out of their infancy. 'Thus far, there have been a few true municipal Wi-Fi success stories and several spectacular failures. But more than half of municipal Wi-Fi networks remain only in the planning stages. The broad consensus among analysts and providers is that the only viable business models will be centered around municipal government applications, which appear to be able to provide cities with the ability to provide both better and more cost-efficient services for residents and increase city revenue. This will ensure that providers like EarthLink can recoup their capital costs within a few years.'"
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Municipal Wi-Fi - A Promise Unfulfilled? More

Municipal Wi-Fi - A Promise Unfulfilled?

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  • Upon further research, (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "Oh shit, this costs a lot of money and we really don't get anything out of it. PROJECT CANCELED."
    • Or the problem is power, specifically lack thereof. In St. Louis, they were going to mount and power the APs on light poles. The problem was that the power was not on during the day.

      The project has been basically canceled, or scaled down [mlive.com].

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
      Yepp. WiFi everywhere just isn't needed. It isn't an essential service. If you want city workers to have network access every where say for the police then data cards and a data plan from a cell company will be cheaper. If you want to provide access to the citizens then Hot Spots at community centers, libraries, and parks will get you 90% of the benefit for 5% of the cost. WiMax may change the cost benefit ratio but right now it costs a lot of money and provides very little benefit.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF ( 813746 )

        If you want to provide access to the citizens then Hot Spots at community centers, libraries, and parks will get you 90% of the benefit for 5% of the cost.

        I strongly disagree. The difference between access when I bring my laptop to the park or library and access in my home and every other place in the area with a laptop or desktop; is enormous. Free wi-fi can replace existing internet access packages from local duopoly. I currently pay Comcast about $45 a month for internet access and I have to deal with their constant outages, outright blocking of VPN traffic to work (I have to SSH tunnel instead), and poor customer service. They are the most affordable op

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
          Community WiFi != Community Internet.
          I never said that community internet was a bad plan.
          Take a look at the Utopia project out in Utah. Wifi is slow and shared fiber is a lot faster and I would bet cheaper to maintain in the long run.
          If I was a business I wouldn't trust wifi for my connection. Cheap fiber would attract me both as a business and at home.

          • I never said that community internet was a bad plan. Take a look at the Utopia project out in Utah. Wifi is slow and shared fiber is a lot faster and I would bet cheaper to maintain in the long run.

            It will never happen here. First, the county is a mix of urban and rural, so population density in rural areas is not sufficient to justify the cost of laying new lines. Second, state law pretty much guarantees that the phone and cable companies are the only ones allowed to lay fiber to the premises and even if they were legally obligated to do so, they would simply sabotage the project by delaying and refusing to lay the lines, just as they have done with competing DSL companies here.

            Realistically, wire

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
              "Second, state law pretty much guarantees that the phone and cable companies are the only ones allowed to lay fiber to the premises"
              Change the law.
              As to the ease of hookup. Well the colleges and or apartment complexes can offer WiFi as part the deal. Same thing for the summer cottages. Outlawing the best possible solution is a problem but the solution to that problem is to change the law and not to use an expensive and less than optimal solution.
              Even with Wifi you will have to have some kind of supporting n

              • Change the law.

                Umm, yeah, I'll get right on that. The issue takes more than 30 seconds to explain and as such will never be a major issue in this state. People here vote based upon gun control, abortion, taxes, and union issues, and that is about it. If I ever mange to make enough money to give AT&T a run for their money in court, I'll let you know. In the mean time we have to deal with the real world.

                Well the colleges and or apartment complexes can offer WiFi as part the deal. Same thing for the summer cottages.

                The colleges and universities do run their own wireless. The reason I mentioned them is because they cause a huge

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
                  "At a guess, maybe the Utah legislators sold it on a platform of being able to censor that intarweb thingy and protect the children?"
                  Actually some ISP offer filtering and some do not. Your view of Utah is typical but frankly unfair. Utah is the home of Novell and Wordperfect. If you ever went there you would probably find a much higher percentage of people that have lived out of the country than just about anywhere else on the planet. Religiously they are very homogeneous but as a group they are actually p

                  • Actually some ISP offer filtering and some do not.

                    Yes, but what the government is allowed to filter is subject to constitutional challenges, while what private ISPs filter is much less so.

                    Your view of Utah is typical but frankly unfair.

                    Lets see, Utah has repeatedly Elected Rep. Orin Hatch, one of the most outspoken advocates of censoring the internet. And wasn't it in Utah where the governor and other legislators were complaining that filters required on government computers by Utah law prevented them from reading the news about the Clinton scandal?

                    Your view of Utah is typical but frankly unfair.

                    Why do you say that? A full 28% of Californians

                    • Re: (Score:2)

                      by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
                      Your remark is unfair because they didn't pass the stupid pro-telecom laws that your elected officials did and are building the fiber network that your state forbids.
                      You feel that you are cultural superior and there for must find some excuse for their success in this area.
                      Hence you make up some excuse to why they did with no proof and state it as fact. Then you bring up unrelated facts that you feel supports your viewpoint.
                      Simple fact is that the people in the Utah/Salt Lake Valley are building the fiber ne

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by N3WBI3 ( 595976 )
          Free wi-fi can replace existing internet access packages from local duopoly.

          ahem... Its not free you're taxes will go up, now the question is: Will the difference between the 300-600 a year you're paying for a DSL pipe be worth giving up for the probably 100-300 you'll be paying for a mush more restricted connection? Do you really think that youll get the same service when its provided by the municipal government and shared by everyone around you that you get with your own incoming pipe?

          They are the mos

          • ahem... Its not free you're[sic] taxes will go up

            Nope. The project is paid for by federal grant money and by the charges for the higher speed packages. It costs the local taxpayer no tax increase.

            Will the difference between the 300-600 a year you're paying for a DSL pipe be worth giving up for the probably 100-300 you'll be paying for a mush[sic] more restricted connection?

            Umm, I already listed the prices for this service to the end user. Your assumption that the connection will be more restricted has no foundation in fact. The truth is there will be less incentive to place restrictions and legally it will be harder to place restrictions since the government project is bound by first amendment concerns, while private companies

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by vought ( 160908 )
        If you want city workers to have network access every where say for the police then data cards and a data plan from a cell company will be cheaper.

        That'll work great here in California, where the cell network was down for 20 minutes shortly after our minor earthquake the other day. Or at ground zero, where there was no telecom whatsoever after 9/11 - except for the poletop radios from Metricom, which had gone out of business a few weeks earlier, thanks to cell company FUD and horrible management.

        Better th

  • 802.11 Wasn't Designed for Municipal Services (Score:5, Informative)

    by TechyImmigrant ( 175943 ) * on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @12:51PM (#21256611) Homepage Journal
    802.11 was designed for indoor use. Read the spec. It talks about indoor propagation and describes a coordination function that works well with that model.

    802.11 doesn't scale well to large footprint cells or high density deployments with lots of APs and clients. It excels indoors allowing a small number of people to attached wirelessly to a wired network.

    The backhaul services are not standardized in 802.11 and so are generally neither interoperable not secure (E.G. UAM at airports).

    Compare with 802.16. It is designed for outdoor base stations, large footprints, indoor, outdoor or mobile clients and has a backhaul architecture and protocol set defined by the WiMAX forum.

    802.11 Municipal WiFi is a round technology crowbarred into a square application.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by snl2587 ( 1177409 )
      But then the problem arises (and please correct me if I'm wrong) of users not having the correct hardware to connect to the better WiFi standards. My university has done a fairly good job maintaining a 802.11g network that services thousands of us at a time with little trouble, and plenty of people connect with plain-ol' wireless B. I know the university paid a lot for that, though, which is probably more than most municipalities are willing to pay per block.
      • > But then the problem arises (and please correct me if I'm wrong) of users not having the correct hardware to connect to the better WiFi standards. My university has done a fairly good job maintaining a 802.11g network that services thousands of us at a time with little trouble, and plenty of people connect with plain-ol' wireless B. I know the university paid a lot for that, though, which is probably more than most municipalities are willing to pay per block.

        Yes. The CCK and OFDM in 2.4GHz PHYs work we

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by homer_ca ( 144738 )
        Your university also has high population density and maybe less than universal coverage. Can you get WiFi in the parking lots and the sports fields? 802.11 is inherently a short range technology. Building any kind of municipal size network out of it will be expensive especially with the low population densities of most sprawling US cities.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by nmos ( 25822 )
          One thing a university has going for it is that it owns most/all of the property that requires coverage.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Nurgled ( 63197 )

      The problem is of course that most people currently do not have hardware for 802.16.

      Does anyone currently make appliances that bridge 802.11 onto an 802.16 network? That way WiMAX could be rolled out blanketing a city, and then the most popular/dense areas could have 802.11 bridges for people to use in the mean time until they invest in their own 802.16 hardware. Private businesses such as cafes and bars may choose to install these devices themselves, allowing them to create a wi-fi hotspot while using the

  • Fred e Zone (Score:4, Informative)

    by Fr05t ( 69968 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @12:53PM (#21256631)
    http://www.fred-ezone.com/ [fred-ezone.com]
    Fredericton has had Wi-Fi rolled out for a couple years now. The status is degraded because we just got hit by tropical storm Noel.
  • Until towns/cities can do this at a reasonable cost, and until providers can actually make a buck off it, I wouldn't expect to see widespread success at public Wi-Fi projects.

    • Re:It's all about the money... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by ShieldW0lf ( 601553 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @01:04PM (#21256741) Journal
      Towns and cities can do this easily. It's so easy that it's trivial.

      It's so easy that people deployed it themselves in disaster relief scenarios despite opposition from the government, rebellious little municipalities with practically no budget deployed it themselves, hell, soldiers are able to drop a bunch of little scurrying robots and set up a wireless mesh network in a blasted urban war zone.

      The technology renders large amounts of infrastructure obsolete, turns the technology into a piece of infrastructure no different from roads and sewage, and makes some very profitable businesses defunct.

      This is why established businesses oppose it and politicians are paid to prevent it. That's pretty much the sum of it.

      • Not really-- MuniWiFi has real problems (Score:4, Informative)

        by postbigbang ( 761081 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @01:45PM (#21257357)
        Although we'll agree that politicians are in the bag of telcos, there are real and factual difficulties with muni-WiFi

        1) bad cellular support grid (3 non-interfering channels, making coverage very difficult)
        2) competition with other wireless, paid services (UMTS, EVDO, etc)
        3) competition from commercial 'hotspot' providers (hotels, paid-hotspots, etc.)
        4) poor business models that caved Google, Earthlink, and others
        5) the silliness of using a LAN technology (look at the specs as mentioned up-thread) for a MAN/WAN purpose, as the CSMA/CA technology plainly sucks for services that require mulitple concurrent low-latency streams from a single AP)
        6) non-existent subnet handoff (all solutions are proprietary, so far), and lack of VLAN wizardry
        7) super-dumb security-- as in NONE as there are no encryption schemes, poor to no authentication (too expensive) and no session controls

        Plainly, muni-Wifi is a great idea, if WiFi itself worked, and if there were business models to sustain its deployment. It's a misapplication of the technology, politicians aside. We're just not there yet in terms of building meshes that provide excellent or in many cases, just minimally usable coverage.

      • Towns and cities can do this easily. It's so easy that it's trivial.

        An easy enough claim to make. Yet, reality is different - cities and towns have found it difficult to do.

        This is why established businesses oppose it and politicians are paid to prevent it. That's pretty much the sum of it.

        Yeah, that's the Slashdot default position - especially for anything they've decided is 'easy' to do. (Frequently without any actual experience in doing.)

        Fact is, deploying municipal wi-fi is d

    • Agreed. Municipal WiFi is a stupid idea. How does giving earthlink a guaranteed monopoly with guaranteed profits be a good thing? What ever happened to free market efficiencies? The only thing that can possibly happen is costs will climb, climb and climb some more. Lack of competition guarantees it.

  • Municipal water - promise unfullfilled (Score:4, Insightful)

    by iamacat ( 583406 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @12:53PM (#21256641)
    What's going to happen to all the well-digging companies? After all, just like with a wireless base station, one pipe can be shared by at least a dozen users.

    • Re:Municipal water - promise unfullfilled (Score:4, Insightful)

      by nine-times ( 778537 ) <nine.times@gmail.com> on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @01:26PM (#21257041) Homepage

      This is the idea that I keep getting back to if I think about the ISPs enough: the Internet should be thought of as infrastructure. It's comparable to roads, water, and electricity. For many reasons (including various humanitarian and economic reasons), we want a robust infrastructure in our country that is efficient and maintained well enough that the general citizenry can take it for granted. Yes, there are some people who live out in the middle of nowhere without water, electicity or roads, but most people in most places are able to simply expect that those things will exist and work.

      The implimentation is different in different places and for different sorts of infrastructure. I pay a private company for electricity. I don't pay to drive on roads, but I do pay tolls for some bridges. There's still some wiggle-room for how the whole internet thing happens, but it needs to happen in such a way that the gross majority of people receive acceptable access at a reasonable price.

      • the Internet should be thought of as infrastructure. It's comparable to roads, water, and electricity.

        Funny enough, it's even more comparable to telephone and cable, and yet those aren't considered public utilities.

        'course, that's not to say I disagree with you, but your analogy is, I think, far from apt. There are many reasons why one might want to socialize internet access, but it's hardly a vital utility that isn't easily managed by disparate private entities, as is the case with roads, water, and elect
        • The telephone company cannot legally deny you free 911 service.

          Of course I'm not sure what the equivalent of a 911 call on the internet is.

          Though, I believed the lines and content should be provided by two different companies and the company that owns the lines be a well regulated non-profit company devoted to giving everyone the ability to have internet. If they want it, they'll have to pay for it between competing content providers etc etc.

        • Yeah, and the telephone and cable systems have had to be regulated because of abuse. Besides, I'm not saying that the internet has to be entirely public. I pay private companies for my gas and power. But they're still treated differently from cable and internet because they're considered infrastructure.

          Unfortunately, the US doesn't seem to treat it's communications infrastructure quite as though it's real infrastructure. It's more like a luxury item, in spite of the fact that so much of our society is

          • Yeah, and the telephone and cable systems have had to be regulated because of abuse.

            They have to be regulated because they are natural monopolies, and as such, the free market fails in those cases. But that doesn't imply that socialization is the answer. That only means that, for example, incumbents should be obligated to make their networks (which were built using massive tax breaks which amount to public subsidization, not to mention land easements) available to competitors at low rates (which they were

            • Bah, that's just BS.

              Not really. The number of organizations and businesses who have started assuming that people have internet access is huge. It's the way things work now. As more people access services online, fewer resources are being spent on the offline alternatives. Sure, you can live without internet, but you can't "function" in the societal sense. You're basically cut-off. You can't even find a decent job these days without going through Monster.com or Craigslist or something.

    • What's going to happen to all the well-digging companies?

      The well-digging companies are coining money. But they are doing it in places where there is a shortage of water.

  • Municipal WiFi is a Scam (Score:3, Informative)

    by LM741N ( 258038 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @12:53PM (#21256643)
    I don't know about any other cities, but in Portland Oregon the municipal wifi was billed as ,wonderful system that would provide everyone with free broadband. Well if you can log in to the system, you find all sorts or limitations- and something else- that there is a parallel pay Wifi system run by the same company. Gee, wonder how that happened? I never heard any public discussion on the matter. And I wonder how much Portland paid for this sweet deal?

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by boguslinks ( 1117203 )
      Maybe it's time to stop believing politicians when they promise free wifi, or for that matter, free anything?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jockm ( 233372 )
      Well as I understand the deal, they paid nothing (theoretically). They give Metro-Fi access to public buildings and other fixed points (like like light posts, power poles, etc), in return the city gets a guaranteed amount of bandwidth and QoS on the network for Police, Fire, etc use.

      I am curious about your problems. I admit that public wi-fi is a YMMV kinda think, but I have had no real problems. It's faster than my EVDO Phone (which I can bridge to my laptop). Find a place to sit, connect, and I am in.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by LM741N ( 258038 )
        Bandwidth for police/fire? You've got to be kidding. They paid a zillion dollars of our tax money for that Motorola trunked radio system. They damn well have it working right.

        And the last thing I want when I dial 911 is for that WiFi system to be in the loop. May as well drive to the ER. (or shoot the intruder, lol) I am unable to connect much of the time and I am right in the heart of the system. Plus it won't start up with Firefox. I can only get it to work with IE. I'm not certain what or if a

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by jockm ( 233372 )
          Well as I understand it, it is for additional data services, and remember that "etc" well there is a lot the potentially a lot of other municipal services that would be able to take advantage of it. But I dunno as opposed to just taking word of some random guy on /. and then getting angry and then start wildly speculating, you could -- I dunno -- just google a little. Oh but what am I saying this is /.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by keithjr ( 1091829 )
      Brookline, MA (a smaller town bordering Boston) has it, border-to-border. It's available for free in parks and public areas; from homes it has a subscription fee.

      http://www.brooklinewireless.com/ [brooklinewireless.com]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by faedle ( 114018 )
      Except Portland's system doesn't work either.

      As somebody who has tried to use the system, you can typically only get service if you're sitting under the node, outside. You get more than 50 feet from the node location, and it either doesn't work, or works so spotty that you can't shift your laptop or even cough without losing packets or connectivity.

      And forget about inside.

      MetroFi is also now "holding the city hostage" by saying that they will only "complete" the network if the City promises to become an "a
    • The city of Portland hasn't paid one cent for the building of MetroFi network.

      The agreement was that MetroFi could use city property (light poles) to locate their antennas, and in exchange, they had to offer a free Wi-Fi service. When the network is finished, the city of Portland will run tests to see if it meets their standards for use by the city, and if so, the city will purchase the paid access for city use. The company was perfectly free, right from the start, to offer the paid service, and to make t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by saskboy ( 600063 )
      The out-going Saskatchewan government's IT Office implemented a downtown WiFi for Saskatoon, Regina, Moose Jaw, and Prince Albert last year, and its apparently dead dog slow for many users. Worse, they put it on the two largest university campuses, which already had free WiFi for students.

  • Open Wifi Project (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Here's a new alternative to the typical commercial city wifi deployment, that just started up in the past few months:

    http://sonic.net/wifi/ [sonic.net]

    In short, you dedicate a fixed amount of your bandwidth as a free wifi spot. There's talk about you eventually making some money off it, but currently that's not offered as it's too new.

    Disclaimer: I am a very happy sonic.net customer. I have no affiliation with them other than that. However, I have signed up for this, and will be trying it out.
  • ...

    sit in a park on a sunny summer morning, pull out your laptop, and get some work done without missing the good weather
    Can anyone read a laptop screen outside on a sunny day? Not me.
  • Putting your faith in the government is crazy. They will not be efficient it is not because of any particular person but a good government should be inefficient. To Deploy a Municipal Wi-Fi Especially in America will require Efficiency not politics. Access is needed to given the most good for the most people. Not what will normally happen give the most good to the right people. Government measures failure so it is not what you do right will promote you it is what you do wrong that gets you in trouble. T
    • You are right.

      We should tear out our water and sewer lines, fire all of our police and firemen, and let corporate America run all of these things. I'm sure they will do a much better job.
      • You misunderstand.
        There is a difference between maintaining a current infrastructure and building a new one.
        Police and Fire Departments are not part of physical infrastructure, They have cars, trucks, horses, or feet to get them where they are needed. If they find that they need more firemen at location A then they Move to Location A. Unlike Wi-Fi where you put a wireless hub and keep it at that location and then you will need to find a way to make sure it doesn't walk away and keep it running. Police and

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by FranTaylor ( 164577 )
          You are mighty good at typing but I still don't see how a pipe with bits in it is any different than a pipe with water in it.

          So you are saying that because Internet usage is not metered, therefore it should be run privately? What if they metered your Internet usage, like, say, Comcast does? One could very well meter Internet usage and charge for it. Poof goes your argument.

          You've put yourself on a slippery slope and even provided your own grease. Your argument about wasteful government is unsubstantiat
          • We don't communicate with water, we use it as a basic need for survival. Thus a problem with our water supply will make Person in government look real bad real soon. Internet communication is a luxury. Human Kind survived for a lot time without it. So a failure in setting up a good Internet system will not harm government officials as much. If you don't setup a water system then you are in trouble. If you don't setup a Wi-Fi network you not in trouble. The government is only really good at suppling the n

            • We don't communicate with water, we use it as a basic need for survival. Thus a problem with our water supply will make Person in government look real bad real soon. Internet communication is a luxury. Human Kind survived for a lot time without it. So a failure in setting up a good Internet system will not harm government officials as much.

              There are many services that municipal governments provide with great efficiency that are not necessary for survival. Sorry, but it's simply a fallacy of logic to generalize all government as bad at handling luxuries. When we're talking about municipal governments, the fact of the matter is, it depends on what municipality you're talking about. There are clear examples of townships that have successfully implemented muni-wifi. Just read the rest of the comments and you'll find a few references. Our fe

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by nine-times ( 778537 )

      Putting your faith in big corporations is crazy. They will screw you over every time, and not because of any particular person but a "good" corporation is built to screw its partners, suppliers, and customers out of every penny possible.

      I actually don't condone putting your faith in the government or the private sector. In any case you have to get involved and keep a watchful eye. People tend to be inefficient, lazy, ineffective, and generally bad at getting things done. It really doesn't matter which t

      • Why don't they teach the kids today, If they don't like a product or service then switch to an other product or service. Unlike government you know where the corporations stand... They want to make money. The government has a lot of agendas Make the Other Party Look bad, Make them look good, get Reelected, Gain more power, even perhaps help other people.
        I really hate the Corporation is evil stuff. The only reason they do evil is because we keep on buying from them Microsoft is Evil for not being friendly wi

        • Re:Putting faith in the governemt. (Score:4, Insightful)

          by nine-times ( 778537 ) <nine.times@gmail.com> on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @03:23PM (#21258625) Homepage

          The problem is that a lot of big companies get to a certain size and power when they can afford to abuse their own customers because they are able to ensure that their customers have no choice. They form little cartels and engage in anti-competitive practices. They use their immense resources to brainwash the public and destroy any competing company, especially if that competing company offers a better product.

          When you hit that point, these companies are worse than the government. They have just as little need to be efficient as "the government", and they really don't have to please their customers anymore. The big difference between themselves and the government at that point is that the government has at least the pretense of "the public good" as a goal, whereas corporations only have "maximizing shareholder investment".

          Yes, you can choose another corporation, and you can choose another government too. But in neither case to revolutions come easy.

  • I agree, it's a scam (Score:2, Interesting)

    by yhetti ( 57297 )
    My fair city [wikipedia.org] recently fell for this kind of scam. 802.11x is basically the absolute worst wireless spec to try and deploy over any area larger than a medium-sized house. Massive interference; everything from cordless phones to microwave ovens. Leaves destroy 90% of the signal. Leaves with fresh rain on them completely destroy even multipath.

    Our city tried so that it could attract high-tech workers. They were gunning for a "revolutionary" wireless deployment using IP6 so they could do multicast groups w

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Sleepy ( 4551 )
      Why protect the advisor? You're obviously (and justifiably) upset about the waste and unfulfilled promise. It would be interesting if you had the time to Freedom Of Information request or otherwise dig up what the public record was and what advice the city received.

      At the very best, you help another deployment avoid the same mistake. At worst, someone is embarrassed (big deal.. that shouldn't trump the truth).

      My hometown Nashua NH was supposed to do downtown wifi. I think it was killed when Verizon cried to
  • Get this:

    Westminster, in London, is installing Wi-Fi-enabled security cameras that can identify illegally parked cars and issue tickets without an on-site witness. In theory, the number of parking tickets should increase dramatically without much additional cost, and city coffers will swell. "Parking enforcement is the killer application that everyone is looking for," a Westminster City Council member said in early September.
    What's next? Automated ticketing for jaywalking? For picking your nose in public?

    As my sainted grandmother would say, "Bad cess to them!"

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Dr. Eggman ( 932300 )
      Moral Statute Machine: PHAEDRU5's grandmother, you are fined one credit for a violation of the Verbal Morality Statute.

      Moral Statute Machine: Your repeated violation of the Verbal Morality Statute, code 777, has caused me to notify the San Angeles^W^W Westminster Police Department. Please remain where you are for your reprimand.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bhmit1 ( 2270 )

      Wi-Fi-enabled security cameras that can identify illegally parked cars and issue tickets without an on-site witness

      The current system is based on random luck. You don't feed the meter and maybe you're lucky, or maybe you aren't and you have a ticket. If you change to a system where every violator always pays, you're back to a fair system (especially if police aren't allowed to undo tickets for their friends). And with all this new revenue, you can decrease the fines so they don't become an unfair burden

    • Westminster, in London, is installing Wi-Fi-enabled security cameras that can identify illegally parked cars and issue tickets without an on-site witness.
      What's next? Automated ticketing for jaywalking? For picking your nose in public?
      What's next?

      A huge increase in the sales of Wi-Fi jammers.

    • Get this:

      Westminster, in London, is installing Wi-Fi-enabled security cameras that can identify illegally parked cars and issue tickets without an on-site witness. In theory, the number of parking tickets should increase dramatically without much additional cost, and city coffers will swell.

      ...and all it would take is one torqued off geek with a parking ticket, a soldering iron, and some spare electronics parts.

      Then the revolution begins.

      /P

  • http://www.albanyny.org/newsarticles/07-05-22/downtown_albany_is_going_wireless_for_free.aspx [albanyny.org] I live outside of Albany, NY where, apparently, there is a WiFi freenet available in parts of the city. I have an iPhone (without EDGE enabled) so I've tried to access it with no luck. I have a friend that lives next-door to Washington park (where the city usually has its big events) and he tells me that he can pick up the free'net sometimes on his patio. bah, i've got nothing more to add, municipal WiFi still s
    • I'm in Albany on business right now. "Free Public WiFi" shows up on my list of available networks, but I can't connect to it at all. Guess I'll just have to settle with the wireless networks in my workplace, my motel room, the coffee shop down the street, etc.
      • Were you joking? In case you weren't, those "Free Public WiFi" peers showing up in your network browser are nothing of the sort. They're people WiFi fishing, hoping to gain access to passwords, credit card information, and so forth. Unfortunately, at least in XP (IIRC), it isn't clear whether a link is an AP or just a peer (Vista visually differentiates them).
  • So how does anyone think they can manage to cover a larger area. In many airports it is expensive, and thus useless to me.

  • broadband access (Score:5, Interesting)

    by xzvf ( 924443 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @01:26PM (#21257045)
    The question we need to ask is if broadband access is required utility that is needed by everyone for economic development but isn't cost effective for private business. Should it be supplemented like roads, buses, trains and run by the government? Should it be a regulated monopoly like gas, water and electric? Non-profit co-op like some other utilities? Heavily regulated private business like airlines and railroads? Or remain what it is now.. unregulated and private?

    • Should it be supplemented like roads, buses, trains and run by the government?
      Yes, in that the government builds the roads and then allows private entities to provide services on the roads. The government should own the infrastructure and nothing more.
    • Minneapolis is rolling theirs out right now and I just don't get it.

      Ours is rolled in with a new (separate technology) wireless setup for municipal vehicles and police cars, also by the same company rolling out the internet service (the projects are tied together).

      My best guess is that the city wanted to replace the cellular-based data service in the cop cars and get something more flexible, but nobody would pay for a huge project like that on its own merits, so it gets tied to citywide Wifi, which gets all

  • Municipal != Free (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @01:27PM (#21257059)
    Municipal Water isn't free.

    Municipal Energy isn't free.

    Municipal Waste Disposal isn't free.

    Municipal Newtwork Service... where did anyone get the idea it should be free?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by goldspider ( 445116 )
      It's the new "Free".

      Free as in Beer.
      Free as in Speech.

      Free as in Taxpayer-Subsidized.
    • No, but they are well regulated and access is guaranteed.

      Actually, if you live in Philadelphia you already pay an income tax whether you like it or not. At least trash pickup is free. Water is cheap as well as gas and electric companies are well regulated enough to keep their prices down.

      The thing about those industries is that there are physical quantities of matter being moved and cost money each time to deliver. With internet connectivity the majority of the cost is the initial infrastructure and as long
    • Don't know about where you live, but where I come from water and waste disposal are 'free at the point of use'.

      A wifi network that is 'free at the point of use' is massively more usable than a chargeable one.

      The costs of providing such a service are rapidly diminishing, and easily provided by local government.

      What I don't get is why the profits of private businesses are supposed to be sacrosanct.

  • Minneapolis Wifi (Score:4, Informative)

    by Nite_Hawk ( 1304 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @02:01PM (#21257589) Homepage
    It's unfortunate that the author didn't mention the municipal wifi network that is being built in Minneapolis. So far service seems to be pretty good, and it helped rescue efforts when the 35w bridge collapsed here:

    http://blog.tmcnet.com/wireless-mobility/wifi-network-helped-minneapolis-deal-with-bridge-collapse.asp [tmcnet.com]

  • They're not all failures (Score:5, Informative)

    by cwgmpls ( 853876 ) on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @02:05PM (#21257647) Journal
    Wireless Minneapolis [minneapolis.mn.us] is rolling out nicely. It is succeeding because
    - It is not free -- but half the price of other ISP providers in the area so it is a great bargain.
    - It is a based on a Municipal Services model, where the city will be the biggest customer of the network. So even if no one signs up, the network provider will still make a profit.

    I expect future muni wifis will use a Municipal Services-based model as well.
    • True the city of minneapolis is an anchor tenant of the service at large, especially with the deployment of the 4.9ghz public safety frequency. This is for police, ambulances, etc. use only. But on top of all of that there are plenty of residential and transient/nomad users already signed up and probably some businesses too.

      Making a profit doesn't actually happen until the huge initial up front capital investment is recouped from service subscriptions, which may take several years.
  • Very similar to this story http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/28/0555258/ [slashdot.org] but like it neglects to mention that big comm companies hold up a lot of the progress with litigation threats. This article does make a good case for cost for big cities. Most large cities probably have a customer base already getting broadband, true. But what about Podunk USA that has little choice? Why hold the threat of a lawsuit over them when they have no choices?
  • Maybe if people tried learning from successes rather than failures there would be more organizations that would get this right.

    And once again, one of the most successful municipal wifi projects in the midwest [lawrencefreenet.org] goes largely unnoticed. Service covers thousands of people in residential neighborhoods and commercial areas. Speed is just about as fast as a cable modem. And I can take my laptop anywhere there is coverage, authenticate, and have Internet access. Faster than SBC DSL, and I don't have to pay the e
  • The real problem with [free] municipal wi-fi is that everyone, slashgeeks especially, seem to have decided that it is the Next Big Thing.
     
    Utterly without evidence that is a) desireable, let alone b) possible.
  • While, it may not be ever present, municipal wi-fi is great when you can find it. The last time I took a trip, it occured to me that the hospitality industry has some money to lose as well, though. I went to St. Louis a few weeks ago and was rather annoyed that my expensive 4-star hotel room didn't include free internet access. Sure, the website advertised internet access, but you had to pay $9.99/night for it. When I travel, don't usually stay in expensive hotels and, believe it or not, the internet ac
    • Sorry, but the $10 a day fee isn't going to the hotel - it is going to the service company with the 1-800 number on the little card in your room. The hotel does not have anyone you can call about problems getting your computer connected up.

      Yes, the geekier crowd doesn't have a problem, but when someone that can just barely use Outlook is trying to get connected up and has no clue they need someone to call. Enter the service company that takes over the help desk functionality.

      Guess what? They are charging

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Teancum ( 67324 )
        That would be the fault of the manager/owner of the hotel who agreed to letting that service company set up the hotel internet connections.

        The criticism is still valid... just that apparently the management of that hotel is clueless about how to set up a computer network (wireless or otherwise) within their hotel and decided to go after a con-artist who is ripping off their customers.
  • You know, that somewhat sizable city north of the border. According to the article, we have the highest density (100 per sq/mile) and the highest connect speeds. But other than those two nuggets, no other info in the article.

    As I recall though, the scope of the Toronto Hydro Wi-Fi project is quite limited in size to the real core of the the downtown core.

    http://www.onezone.ca/index.html [onezone.ca]
  • Here in St. Louis AT&T was granted the rights to deploy city wide wifi, without any bidding process that I'm aware of. This week they announced unceremoniously that they are canceling the project because they didn't realize that the street lamps only receive power at night and it would be too expensive to work around that. It would be funny if it weren't true.

    Pat

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