• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Concord to Get Free Wireless Internet

Posted on: Wednesday, 8 March 2006, 09:00 CST

By Ryan Huff, Contra Costa Times, Walnut Creek, Calif.

Mar. 8--In a few months, you'll be able to sprawl out with a laptop on the Todos Santos Plaza lawn and surf the Internet for free.

In fact, you'll be able to access wireless Internet just about anywhere in a square-mile of downtown as part of a six-month pilot project that could start as soon as May.

Barring any major gaffes with that program, Concord will look to expand next year and become the first city in the East Bay to offer free wireless Internet to all its residents.

All you need to get online is a wireless-enabled computer. The only catch: Your Web browser will feature a 1-inch banner with advertising at the top of the screen.

That's the way Mountain View-based MetroFi makes its money so it can build large WiFi (wireless fidelity) networks without charging cities. The company currently offers free WiFi in the heart of Silicon Valley, a 25-square-mile area that includes Cupertino and nearly all of Sunnyvale and Santa Clara.

"In five years, I think most major cities, suburbs and even more rural communities will have WiFi networks," said Chuck Haas, MetroFi's chief executive officer.

"There's a benefit to local businesses because they can reach their customers through advertising and there's a benefit to residents because they get Internet for free."

The prospect of free Internet brought an elated response from those sipping cappuccinos during the downtown lunch hour Monday.

Sitting outside Starbucks Coffee, which offers wireless Internet access to its customers, Concord native Andy Burt said a citywide WiFi network might persuade him to buy a laptop.

"It's all about convenience," said Burt, a 21-year-old Diablo Valley College student. "That's big for people our age. Sometimes you don't always want to be at work or home when you need to get on the Web."

More places are meeting that demand. You can access wireless Internet while waiting for a flight at Oakland International Airport or catching a Giants game at AT&T Park.

MetroFi, a four-year-old venture capitalist-backed company, has talked with more than a dozen East Bay cities about setting up networks, Haas said. He declined to name the cities, but said none has signed agreements like Concord's.

Pleasant Hill police have used WiFi since last year to access mug shots and file reports, but it's not available to residents. The city of San Ramon has considered a fee-based WiFi system near its community center and Central Park.

Larger cities -- such as San Francisco, Philadelphia and Portland, Ore. -- are vying for large-scale WiFi networks.

"It's becoming necessary for people in the mobile work force," said Subhankar Dhar, a WiFi expert who teaches at San Jose State. "You may not get as fast as connectivity as when you're at home (with wired Internet), but you can still easily send e-mail and get your news."

MetroFi's download speed is 1 megabyte per second, which is typically slower than a wired network, but 20 times faster than a dial-up modem.

The expansion of WiFi won't mean the death of wired networks because consumers still like high-speed connections, Dhar said.

Comcast and other wired Internet providers aren't too worried about competition.

"We offer the widest range of content, faster speeds than DSL or WiFi, reliable service and the most secure, integrated high-speed connection to the Internet," Andrew Johnson, a Comcast spokesman, said in a statement.

Concord has yet to pick a location for the downtown square-mile coverage zone, but it will likely center around Todos Santos Plaza or the police department, said Peter Dragovich, city management director.

Here's how it works: MetroFi will set up a wired "feeder site" on a rooftop, which sends signals to shoe-box-size "repeaters" atop city street lights. Those repeaters then communicate with a laptop or desktop computer to provide Internet access.

A citywide WiFi zone would come at no cost to taxpayers. In fact, Concord would save thousands of dollars every year because building inspectors and other city employees wouldn't need cell phones to transmit reports from laptops back to City Hall, Dragovich said.

Such a system also would provide new avenues for Concord police to battle crime.

For example, if a robbery were taking place at a convenience store, officers could tap into a security camera on a secured Web site and monitor it from their patrol car laptops. This would help them decide how to respond in real time, said Rob Evans, Concord police technology manager.

"It's definitely the wave of the future as far as law enforcement goes," he said.

Ryan Huff covers Concord and Clayton. Reach him at 925-977-8471 or rhuff@cctimes.com.

-----

Copyright (c) 2006, Contra Costa Times, Walnut Creek, Calif.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

NASDAQ-NMS:SBUX, NASDAQ-NMS:CMCSA,

Source: Contra Costa Times (Walnut Creek, Calif.)

More News in this Category