Fed up, US cities take steps to build better broadband

State and local governments aren't typically known for leading the way on technology. Remember that West Virginia library that uses a $20,000 router for a building the size of a trailer?

But all that’s changing fast, at least at the municipal level—and the demand for broadband is what's driving this shift. No longer content to let residents suffer from poor Internet access, cities and towns saw a need to boost their tech savvy. Now many are partnering with technologists in order to take matters into their own hands.

While some municipalities have taken on the extraordinarily complex task of building their own networks, others have succeeded with lower-tech methods. Streamlining permitting processes and readying public infrastructure has helped some draw in new ISPs such as Google Fiber. Other cities and towns are taking advantage of legal processes to pressure incumbents into offering better and cheaper service. And still other cities are laying fiber conduits every time construction workers dig up the ground for unrelated projects, allowing quicker upgrades from cable and copper. In all these ways, cities and towns are showing that smart management can be just as important as high-tech systems when it comes to making broadband accessible and affordable to everyone.

“Hundreds [of cities and towns] have done something already and hundreds more are evaluating it now and are likely to take action,” Christopher Mitchell, director of the Community Broadband Networks Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, told Ars. “I think thousands recognize a need but aren’t committed yet.”

Driving fiber fervor

It’s been obvious for years how important Internet access is in modern life and business. But a few new factors have helped convince municipalities that they have to take action now or risk being left behind.

Google Fiber has had an impact far beyond the few cities where it actually exists. “Google gives something credibility. I think all the cities that are not going to get Google investments are recognizing that they need to do something,” Mitchell said.

Besides the Google effect, growing frustration over a lack of competition is fueling city efforts, with the pending Comcast/Time Warner Cable merger having “set off alarm bells in recognizing that things are getting worse in terms of monopoly,” according to Mitchell.

More than 1,100 cities applied for Google Fiber in 2010, but only Kansas City; Austin, Texas; and Provo, Utah were successful.

“Having world-class bandwidth is maybe even more important than having an NFL football team.”

“We all competed for Google Fiber,” Raleigh, North Carolina CIO Gail Roper told Ars. “That got our heads going in terms of potential benefits and we just felt like we were the right region to push it forward.” After losing out on Google Fiber, Raleigh teamed up with Carrboro, Cary, Chapel Hill, Durham, and Winston-Salem to form the North Carolina Next Generation Network. The area now has a deal with AT&T to bring gigabit fiber to residents.

Cities and towns have come to understand that “having world-class bandwidth is maybe even more important than having an NFL football team,” said Blair Levin, a former FCC official who oversaw development of the National Broadband Plan under President Obama and is now executive director of the Gig.U fiber initiative.

Levin has gone around the country helping cities understand why action at the local level is so important. While Internet service providers often don’t compete against each other in individual cities and towns, the cities and towns are in effect competing against each other because broadband infrastructure fuels growth.

“I was in front of College Station, Texas, and I remember a city councilor saying something to the effect of ‘Oh I get what you’re saying—our cable company doesn’t compete with South Korea Telecom, but we compete with Seoul, Korea,’” Levin told Ars.

Communities are recognizing that broadband "impacts their ability to do everything, whether it be traffic control or schools or civic engagement,” he said. “The biggest change is people are starting to notice how things they do today affect the network they have 10 years from now. You can’t do this overnight. Networks take a lot of time to plan, engineer, and build.”

One problem, many solutions

So what strategies are cities and towns using now to build for that future network? There are a handful of reoccurring approaches.

"Dig once": Municipalities with “dig once” policies require workers to install conduit for fiber cable any time the ground is dug up for electrical and sewer projects or other work. This dramatically reduces the price for laying fiber and speeds up deployment. While cities can deliver service over the fiber themselves, it’s a valuable asset even if they don’t because it can be leased to private telecoms and help lure new providers. Boston and other cities have been doing this for years—San Francisco is just getting started on it now.

“'Dig once' is a bare minimum,” Mitchell said. “Cities need to recognize that even if they don’t want to be an ISP they have to make it easier for other entities to deliver services, and that means 'dig once.'”

Playing hardball: Comcast is going city to city to get approval for its purchase of Time Warner Cable, but not every local government is giving in easily. In Lexington, Kentucky, officials are demanding commitments to improve customer service in the cable franchise agreement, which has lapsed and must be renewed before it can be transferred from TWC. In Worcester, MA, the City Council has declared that it doesn’t want Comcast coming into town. These actions won’t prevent the merger on their own, but they could give the federal government more reason to block it or require extensive customer protections as a condition for approval.

Changing the law: Community-owned networks have helped in cities and towns that couldn’t attract sufficient investment from private ISPs, but they’ve been held back by laws in 20 states that restrict their growth. EPB, a community-owned electric utility in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and the City of Wilson, North Carolina, have asked the Federal Communications Commission to preempt state laws that prevent them from offering Internet service in surrounding towns that have requested it.

Getting infrastructure ready for fiber: Cities are ticking off the items on Google’s “Fiber Ready Checklist” to get their streets ready for a big upgrade. This is as simple as “provid[ing] accurate information about local infrastructure like utility poles, conduit and existing water, gas and electricity lines so we’d know where to efficiently place every foot of fiber.” Google also asks cities to simplify permitting processes and provide access to existing infrastructure to minimize the need for duplicate utility poles and roadwork. The Google Fiber checklist is helpful for attracting any ISP, not just Google.

RFPs: You don’t get what you don’t ask for, so cities have issued RFPs (requests for proposals) and RFIs (requests for information) to get the attention of ISPs and find out what cities need to do to lure a new provider. Louisville, Kentucky; College Station, Texas;  Los Angeles; and numerous others have gone this route.

Public Wi-Fi: While perhaps less crucial than a fast, wired connection to every home, Wi-Fi in government buildings and public places offers a convenience to many and can help poor people who can't afford home Internet service get online. Boston and New York are among the cities setting up Wi-Fi networks aimed at low-income areas.

Teaming up: Cities and towns from across the country are meeting with each other to share best practices. The latest example is Next Century Cities, a coalition of more than 30 cities trying to upgrade to gigabit service. Cities from Idaho, Indiana, Texas, Massachusetts, Colorado, Illinois, Tennessee, Kansas, Missouri, Louisiana, Kentucky, Washington, California, Oregon, North Carolina, Maine, Maryland, and Minnesota are involved.

“Cities are looked at to make sure there is sufficient infrastructure and quality of life,” Levin said. “Broadband is going to be one of those things. You can’t have a world-class city without world-class broadband. But the market dynamics don’t necessarily drive that, and they have to figure out a way of changing those market dynamics.”