It was going to be so cool. We’d all wander around big cities with the ability to whip out our Wi-Fi-enabled gadgets and tap into massive city-sponsored Wi-Fi networks that would provide us with fast and free Internet access no matter where we roamed. We’d see economic development, quality of life improvements, better communication tools for city workers, and even a technological leg up for marginalized members of society. It sounded almost utopian. So why aren’t we getting a signal? Where’s our Wi-Fi?
It turns out that it’s stuck in city hall committee meetings, or it’s being cut off by telecom bigwigs who no longer think they can foot the bill, or it’s in coffee shops where the people who seem to want it the most already have it. Today, according to
www.muniwireless.com, there are only 92 active citywide Wi-Fi setups--most of them small--and an additional 40 deployments for public safety use only. While 215 more deployments are planned, no one can say if or when they’ll actually come online.
True, there have been some moderate successes. Anaheim, CA has built out 70 percent of its ambitious Wi-Fi network, and a Google-sponsored network covers 12 square miles of its hometown of Mountain View, CA. Philadelphia has built out 65 square miles of a planned 135 square miles of coverage so far, but the fact that EarthLink, the ISP responsible for setting up Philly’s network, has been installing an average of 42 nodes per square mile rather than the planned 20 to 25, hints at the technological and financial problems involved.
No Money, No Service
EarthLink, which saw citywide Wi-Fi as a great potential business and jumped in enthusiastically all around the country, is now walking away. In August, as part of a larger corporate shake-up, the ISP realized it no longer wanted to commit to paying for the infrastructure, and it canceled plans in Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, and several other cities. “We will not devote any new capital to the old muni Wi-Fi model that has us taking all of the risk by fronting all of the capital, then paying to buy our customers one by one,” EarthLink CEO Rolla P. Huff said in an analyst conference call.
Two months later, AT&T pulled the plug on St. Louis, where it had planned to cover 62 square miles, saying it couldn’t find a suitable power source for its antennas and couldn’t figure out how to recoup its costs. (That plan called for 20 hours of free service per user per month, with supplemental fees for faster access speeds.)
Without the ISPs to foot the bill, local governments have gotten nervous. Politicians who are happy to make grandiose promises about Wi-Fi, as long as someone else is paying for the hardware, are far less likely to advocate it when it becomes a multimillion-dollar item in next year’s budget. “Municipalities have gone a little funny in the head with their expectations with respect to Wi-Fi,” said industry analyst Craig Mathias, principal with Farpoint Group. “They should be bending over backwards to help these guys get their stuff installed, not trying to squeeze them.”
In fact, said Mathias, “I don’t think municipal governments should own and operate telecommunications networks in any form. The best way to encourage innovation is to let the private sector do it, motivated by profit.” His solution: a national telecommunications policy that puts in place a regulatory framework to encourage the development of the services the public wants.
Craig Settles, a wireless consultant and author of Fighting the Good Fight for Municipal Wireless, comes at the issue from the opposite angle: The city should be the owner. “The city should be a technology consumer, buying the infrastructure, controlling it, giving access to its mobile workers, and tying in parking meters, security cameras, and anything else that’s useful. They take a capital hit, but there are no recurring costs. It’s pragmatic to own the network. It’s a better return on investment.” Only then, said Settles, should the city ponder how to open up access to local businesses and citizens.
Political Problems
In 2005, San Francisco’s mayor, Gavin Newsom, proposed a grand “Wi-Fi in every pot” vision to cover 49 square miles of his city with Wi-Fi access, with EarthLink and Google providing the money and the tools. But EarthLink backed out of its $14 to $17 million commitment. In a November referendum rendered pointless by the EarthLink reversal, voters supported the municipal Wi-Fi plan, but why wouldn’t they when there was no specific cost attached?
South of San Francisco, Silicon Valley has a massive plan to cover up to 1,500 square miles at a cost of $100 to $200 million, but Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, the agency in charge, has yet to find even the $500,000 it needs to get two 1–square mile test projects for Wireless Silicon Valley going. Settles points out that with 44 cities jammed into the Valley, the number of politicians and lawyers who have to agree on a regional solution (not to mention dozens of potential vendors each looking for a financial model for success) is daunting.
Wireless Silicon Valley co-chairman Brian Moura said, however, that 18 cities at the northern end of the Valley have already been working together for years on these issues, so coordination isn’t his major concern. The overall project is still in the RFP stage, he explained, adding that, “I don’t have any predictions about when the system will ultimately be deployed.”
WiMAX in the Wings
In Chicago, it’s the issue of obsolescence that’s slowing things down. The Windy City is one of many asking what comes after Wi-Fi and whether the equipment will be upgradable. With its longer range, licensed and interference-free wavelengths, and faster speeds, WiMax is giving pause to many cities that had been pondering nothing but Wi-Fi. In November, Clearwire and Sprint Nextel, the two companies working together on a nationwide WiMax rollout, broke up, leaving the immediate future of WiMax in doubt. Nevertheless, Sprint Nextel spokesman John Polivka said that an employee soft launch would happen by the end of 2007; customer experience will be optimized in the first quarter; and commercial service will begin in the second quarter not only in Chicago but in other locales as well.
According to some experts, WiMax is a distraction on the path to ubiquitous Wi-Fi. “WiMax isn’t going to deliver the kind of user experience that Wi-Fi delivers to end-user devices,” said Esme Vos, founder of
www.muniwireless.com. “WiMax may replace cellular over time,” added Mathias, “but Wi-Fi is much cheaper for the kinds of networks cities are talking about.”
Cost isn’t the main issue, said Sprint Nextel’s Polivka, who points out that WiMax’ speed, reach (there’s less logging on and off), and lack of interference create a desktop-like Internet experience wherever you roam. “Today’s mobile customer wants to share files and download videos and do all sorts of things that you normally have to be at your home or office to do,” he said. “WiMax delivers that experience, and it’s going to show up in all kinds of consumer devices such as cameras and camcorders to let you upload, share, and even print files instantly without wires.”
The Starbucks Factor
Another reason municipal Wi-Fi is having trouble launching is that there’s already plenty of privately sponsored Wi-Fi out there, and the people who want it are by and large satisfied. Nationwide, there are more than 65,000 hotspots in airports, coffee shops, hotels, and in other locations, according to JiWire Inc. There are a whopping 535 in Atlanta and even 524 in relatively small Austin, Texas. Given that fact, would it be smart for Austin to invest $20 million in citywide Wi-Fi? City of Austin CIO Pete Collins has designed a limited deployment for parts of the city but was wisely reluctant to throw in his whole lot with EarthLink or another partner, or to commit to technologies he fears may become obsolete.
And in the end, does it make sense to cover so much territory without considering what’s in it? In-Stat senior network analyst Daryl Schoolar says that companies are spending millions on building muni-networks in areas where there’s not much interest. So, as cities scale back, the free or low-cost access that was supposed to blanket low-income neighborhoods and foster so-called “digital inclusion” evaporates. Among major cities, only Houston has set aside a few million dollars specifically for digital inclusion projects.
But given that Wi-Fi is already ubiquitous on laptops and will eventually be ubiquitous in the cell phones we all carry, we’re sure to get it someday, somehow. As Craig Mathias said, “Wi-Fi is now part of the culture. It’s inevitable.” The biggest challenge will be for city officials to implement Wi-Fi to manage governmental tasks first and only then expand it to deliver on lofty promises of inclusion and economic development. First the parking meters, then the parks.
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