City Utilities (CU) in Springfield, Missouri, recently announced that over the next four years, they will expand the community’s fiber optic network. CenturyLink will lease dark fiber on the Springfield infrastructure in order to offer Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) Internet access to residents and businesses in Springfield and in areas beyond the city. In addition to the great news about this sizeable expansion, experts feel optimistic to see a national ISP working with a pioneering municipal network.

Working with CenturyLink First, Then Others

CU will spend around $120 million to add more than 1,000 fiber miles to their existing 700-mile fiber infrastructure. SpringNet has provided connectivity to local businesses since the late 1990s and has helped spur economic development in Springfield.

CenturyLink, as the first Internet access provider to lease dark fiber on the publicly owned network, and Springfield expect to begin connecting residents and businesses by the spring of 2020. According to CU General Manager Scott Miller, the 15-year arrangement with CenturyLink will fund much of the expansion and rates will not increase for current CU customers.

Miller estimates that CU will complete the expansion within three years. Because the CenturyLink agreement is not exclusive, CU hopes to lease excess capacity to other Internet access companies or businesses. In addition to encouraging options for Springfield, CU wants to deploy more fiber throughout the community to facilitate 5G technology, which requires ample fiber to support high numbers of small cell sites.

City Utilities (CU) in Springfield, Missouri, recently announced that over the next four years, they will expand the community’s fiber optic network. CenturyLink will lease dark fiber on the Springfield infrastructure in order to offer Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) Internet access to residents and businesses in Springfield and in areas beyond the city. In addition to the great news about this sizeable expansion, experts feel optimistic to see a national ISP working with a pioneering municipal network.

Working with CenturyLink First, Then Others

CU will spend around $120 million to add more than 1,000 fiber miles to their existing 700-mile fiber infrastructure. SpringNet has provided connectivity to local businesses since the late 1990s and has helped spur economic development in Springfield.

CenturyLink, as the first Internet access provider to lease dark fiber on the publicly owned network, and Springfield expect to begin connecting residents and businesses by the spring of 2020. According to CU General Manager Scott Miller, the 15-year arrangement with CenturyLink will fund much of the expansion and rates will not increase for current CU customers.

Miller estimates that CU will complete the expansion within three years. Because the CenturyLink agreement is not exclusive, CU hopes to lease excess capacity to other Internet access companies or businesses. In addition to encouraging options for Springfield, CU wants to deploy more fiber throughout the community to facilitate 5G technology, which requires ample fiber to support high numbers of small cell sites.

City Utilities (CU) in Springfield, Missouri, recently announced that over the next four years, they will expand the community’s fiber optic network. CenturyLink will lease dark fiber on the Springfield infrastructure in order to offer Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) Internet access to residents and businesses in Springfield and in areas beyond the city. In addition to the great news about this sizeable expansion, experts feel optimistic to see a national ISP working with a pioneering municipal network.

Working with CenturyLink First, Then Others

CU will spend around $120 million to add more than 1,000 fiber miles to their existing 700-mile fiber infrastructure. SpringNet has provided connectivity to local businesses since the late 1990s and has helped spur economic development in Springfield.

CenturyLink, as the first Internet access provider to lease dark fiber on the publicly owned network, and Springfield expect to begin connecting residents and businesses by the spring of 2020. According to CU General Manager Scott Miller, the 15-year arrangement with CenturyLink will fund much of the expansion and rates will not increase for current CU customers.

Miller estimates that CU will complete the expansion within three years. Because the CenturyLink agreement is not exclusive, CU hopes to lease excess capacity to other Internet access companies or businesses. In addition to encouraging options for Springfield, CU wants to deploy more fiber throughout the community to facilitate 5G technology, which requires ample fiber to support high numbers of small cell sites.

Named the Intelligent Community of the Year by the Intelligent Communities Forum in 2012, Riverside, California has continued to work toward broadband expansion, digital inclusion and take full advantage of their fiber optic infrastructure. To offer more options for commercial and institutional entities in the community, the city council approved a dark fiber leasing program to be operated and maintained by Riverside Public Utilities (RPU). Officially launched in 2018, the program makes the city’s 120-mile dark fiber network available for Internet service providers (ISPs), wireless operators, and mobile carriers to lease and provide service to industrial and commercial customers. 

Becoming an Innovation Hub

Riverside’s growing reputation as a smart city has helped turn the community into a hub for start up companies, especially in the technology industry. Located just east of Los Angeles, Riverside was ranked as 19th on MSN Money’s list of the best cities in the U.S. to grow a business and several large companies, such as SolarMax, have recently located there. 

While the fiber network was originally constructed for running the operational facilities of power and water, the city had the foresight to finance and construct fiber to every city facility. With the new leasing program, this original network is now an essential backbone for providing the city’s businesses and industries with the high-speed service they need to compete with surrounding communities. 

Open for Business

Named the Intelligent Community of the Year by the Intelligent Communities Forum in 2012, Riverside, California has continued to work toward broadband expansion, digital inclusion and take full advantage of their fiber optic infrastructure. To offer more options for commercial and institutional entities in the community, the city council approved a dark fiber leasing program to be operated and maintained by Riverside Public Utilities (RPU). Officially launched in 2018, the program makes the city’s 120-mile dark fiber network available for Internet service providers (ISPs), wireless operators, and mobile carriers to lease and provide service to industrial and commercial customers. 

Becoming an Innovation Hub

Riverside’s growing reputation as a smart city has helped turn the community into a hub for start up companies, especially in the technology industry. Located just east of Los Angeles, Riverside was ranked as 19th on MSN Money’s list of the best cities in the U.S. to grow a business and several large companies, such as SolarMax, have recently located there. 

While the fiber network was originally constructed for running the operational facilities of power and water, the city had the foresight to finance and construct fiber to every city facility. With the new leasing program, this original network is now an essential backbone for providing the city’s businesses and industries with the high-speed service they need to compete with surrounding communities. 

Open for Business

Named the Intelligent Community of the Year by the Intelligent Communities Forum in 2012, Riverside, California has continued to work toward broadband expansion, digital inclusion and take full advantage of their fiber optic infrastructure. To offer more options for commercial and institutional entities in the community, the city council approved a dark fiber leasing program to be operated and maintained by Riverside Public Utilities (RPU). Officially launched in 2018, the program makes the city’s 120-mile dark fiber network available for Internet service providers (ISPs), wireless operators, and mobile carriers to lease and provide service to industrial and commercial customers. 

Becoming an Innovation Hub

Riverside’s growing reputation as a smart city has helped turn the community into a hub for start up companies, especially in the technology industry. Located just east of Los Angeles, Riverside was ranked as 19th on MSN Money’s list of the best cities in the U.S. to grow a business and several large companies, such as SolarMax, have recently located there. 

While the fiber network was originally constructed for running the operational facilities of power and water, the city had the foresight to finance and construct fiber to every city facility. With the new leasing program, this original network is now an essential backbone for providing the city’s businesses and industries with the high-speed service they need to compete with surrounding communities. 

Open for Business

Named the Intelligent Community of the Year by the Intelligent Communities Forum in 2012, Riverside, California has continued to work toward broadband expansion, digital inclusion and take full advantage of their fiber optic infrastructure. To offer more options for commercial and institutional entities in the community, the city council approved a dark fiber leasing program to be operated and maintained by Riverside Public Utilities (RPU). Officially launched in 2018, the program makes the city’s 120-mile dark fiber network available for Internet service providers (ISPs), wireless operators, and mobile carriers to lease and provide service to industrial and commercial customers. 

Becoming an Innovation Hub

Riverside’s growing reputation as a smart city has helped turn the community into a hub for start up companies, especially in the technology industry. Located just east of Los Angeles, Riverside was ranked as 19th on MSN Money’s list of the best cities in the U.S. to grow a business and several large companies, such as SolarMax, have recently located there. 

While the fiber network was originally constructed for running the operational facilities of power and water, the city had the foresight to finance and construct fiber to every city facility. With the new leasing program, this original network is now an essential backbone for providing the city’s businesses and industries with the high-speed service they need to compete with surrounding communities. 

Open for Business

Named the Intelligent Community of the Year by the Intelligent Communities Forum in 2012, Riverside, California has continued to work toward broadband expansion, digital inclusion and take full advantage of their fiber optic infrastructure. To offer more options for commercial and institutional entities in the community, the city council approved a dark fiber leasing program to be operated and maintained by Riverside Public Utilities (RPU). Officially launched in 2018, the program makes the city’s 120-mile dark fiber network available for Internet service providers (ISPs), wireless operators, and mobile carriers to lease and provide service to industrial and commercial customers. 

Becoming an Innovation Hub

Riverside’s growing reputation as a smart city has helped turn the community into a hub for start up companies, especially in the technology industry. Located just east of Los Angeles, Riverside was ranked as 19th on MSN Money’s list of the best cities in the U.S. to grow a business and several large companies, such as SolarMax, have recently located there. 

While the fiber network was originally constructed for running the operational facilities of power and water, the city had the foresight to finance and construct fiber to every city facility. With the new leasing program, this original network is now an essential backbone for providing the city’s businesses and industries with the high-speed service they need to compete with surrounding communities. 

Open for Business

For several years now, Tacoma, Washington, has pondered the fate of its Click! municipal open access network. In the spring of 2018, the community issued an RFI/Q searching for interested private sector partners that would lease the network from the Tacoma Power Utility (TPU). After reviewing responses, consulting experts, and comparing potential arrangements, Tacoma has narrowed the field of possible partners. The goal is to put the network on a sustainable and competitive footing both financially and technologically. Tacoma is following a path that will retain public ownership of the Click! network as the network continues to expand.

Click! has offered considerable benefits during its lifetime, but the network retains considerable debt even as it will soon require more upgrades to continue competing with Comcast. The cable television system is rigged against small operators and while the open access Internet side creates many benefits, Click!’s ISPs just don’t have enough subscribers to make the network financially viable into the future.   The discussion around Click’s finances are complicated because the broadband network is used for both external customers and internal utility uses -- the rate modeling around how to allocate costs is a process that requires subjective analysis (e.g. should the costs be allocated based on bandwidth or evenly split among each service). Some have credibly accused past TPU officials with cooking the books to make Click!’s financial status worse than it actually was. Nevertheless, Click! still doesn’t appear to be financially sustainable when costs are allocated more reasonably. Given the upgrades needed by the cable system, we fear that preserving the status quo will do more harm than good to the community over the medium and long terms; Tacoma needs to make a change to avoid being stuck solely with the broadband monopolies that plague the rest of us.

For several years now, Tacoma, Washington, has pondered the fate of its Click! municipal open access network. In the spring of 2018, the community issued an RFI/Q searching for interested private sector partners that would lease the network from the Tacoma Power Utility (TPU). After reviewing responses, consulting experts, and comparing potential arrangements, Tacoma has narrowed the field of possible partners. The goal is to put the network on a sustainable and competitive footing both financially and technologically. Tacoma is following a path that will retain public ownership of the Click! network as the network continues to expand.

Click! has offered considerable benefits during its lifetime, but the network retains considerable debt even as it will soon require more upgrades to continue competing with Comcast. The cable television system is rigged against small operators and while the open access Internet side creates many benefits, Click!’s ISPs just don’t have enough subscribers to make the network financially viable into the future.   The discussion around Click’s finances are complicated because the broadband network is used for both external customers and internal utility uses -- the rate modeling around how to allocate costs is a process that requires subjective analysis (e.g. should the costs be allocated based on bandwidth or evenly split among each service). Some have credibly accused past TPU officials with cooking the books to make Click!’s financial status worse than it actually was. Nevertheless, Click! still doesn’t appear to be financially sustainable when costs are allocated more reasonably. Given the upgrades needed by the cable system, we fear that preserving the status quo will do more harm than good to the community over the medium and long terms; Tacoma needs to make a change to avoid being stuck solely with the broadband monopolies that plague the rest of us.