Glenwood Springs recently released a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) as it looks for firms to help them develop broadband planning. The Colorado community’s residential Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) pilot program obtained a 25 percent take rate just by word of mouth and according to the RFQ, community leaders in Glenwood Springs are ready to expand that success. Proposals are due February 28th.

Beyond The Pilot

We told you about the community’s early deployment of fiber for businesses, community anchor institutions (CAIs), and  municipal facilities, and how the city offered wireless service to residents. The pilot program offers the opportunity for 36 homes to connect to the fiber network; speeds range from 100 Megabits per second (Mbps) to 1 Gigabit per second (Gbps) at $40 - $70 per month, respectively. The program obtained a positive cash flow in its third month and broke even at 58 months, according to the RFQ.

The RFQ states:

The City is seeking qualified firms to assist the City with the development of (1) a financially sustainable broadband internet business model (“Model”) and (2) a detailed implementation plan.  The Model will consist of a comprehensive business plan, detailed financial model, and recommended financing options.  Upon successful delivery and adoption of the comprehensive business model (Phase 1), an implementation plan consisting of network design, construction documents, sample RFP documents, and a marketing strategy will be developed (Phase 2).  

Glenwood Springs already owns significant fiber resources, its own Broadband Department within the municipal electric utility, and has been operating the network since 2002. The community opted out of restrictive state law SB 152 in 2008.

Glenwood Springs is home to approximately 10,000 people and known for its outdoor recreation. One of the first communities in the U.S. to have electric lights, it’s a community that developed a self-reliant streak from its frontier past. Learn more about the community and how they developed their existing network in episode 206...

The mythical Paul Bunyan was enormous. Paul Bunyan Communications’ GigaZone appears to be following his example as it continues to expand throughout northern rural Minnesota. The cooperative recently announced that they are expanding the upgrade once again, bringing Gigabit per second (Gbps) capacity to their members via the Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network. This time, members in the communities of Kelliher and Northome will have access to the upgrade.

The Big Gig

The expansion brings gigabit network to more than 1,700 additional locations; this will bring Paul Bunyan’s GigaZone footprint to more than 29,400 locations. The network covers more than 5,000 square miles in Beltrami County and also reaches areas of Cass, Hubbard, Itasca, Koochiching, and St. Louis Counties.

In November 2016, the cooperative began offering service on the Red Lake Nation, which makes it one of only a few tribal communities with high-quality Internet access. Paul Bunyan provides gigabit connectivity to local schools for affordable rates and has been awarded the Leading Lights National Award for most Innovative Gigabit Broadband Service.

A Long Time Coming

Paul Bunyan Telephone began in 1950 when the residents in very rural northern Minnesota either had no telephone service, or received it from their townships, which meant they had to share lines with up to nine other customers. As a prerequisite to obtaining a loan from the Rural Telephone Administration (RTA) through the Rural Electric Administration (REA), the Co-op Board had to purchase and operate an existing system. They started with the privately owned Kelliher Telephone Company along with the Hendrickson Township Telephone system. In addition funds they had obtained by selling memberships in the cooperative, the board directors agreed to mortgage their own property as collateral so another local cooperative and a local bank would loan Paul Bunyan Telephone enough to purchase both telephone systems. It was a risk, but it paid off.

Over the decades,...

In a opinion piece in the Salisbury Post, resident Rex Boner encourages his fellow local citizens to “make 2017 the year of Fibrant.” As a relatively new transplant to Salisbury, Rex describes how he and his wife came to the city from Atlanta to be closer to his family and was pleasantly surprised by the community’s municipal Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network. 

"It Seems Like A No-Brainer"

He’s amazed that more people are not subscribers because he and his wife find the service reliable, fast, and more affordable than the Internet access they had in Atlanta. Rex writes:

Fibrant is something that we should be very proud of, and I believe that it will prove to be a helpful component of our city’s economic development efforts.

Why we would collectively choose out-of-town internet and television providers who do not invest in our community and who provide more expensive and inferior service is beyond me. Throw in the fact that low Fibrant subscription rates ultimately leads to higher city costs since we own this system no matter what, and the decision to utilize it and benefit from it seems like a “no-brainer."

Ups And Downs In Salisbury

Fibrant began offering services to homes and businesses in Salisbury in 2010 and in 2015 upgraded to offering 10 Gigabit per second (Gbps) symmetrical services. The network had already been offering 1 Gbps symmetrical service for around $100 per month. Throughout the years, the community and Fibrant have had to contend with a number of difficulties. The Great Recession and stiff competitive pricing from incumbents Time Warner Cable and Comcast took their toll on the ability to quickly attract subscribers and the community’s bond rating took a hit, but has since been elevated.

In 2011, Time Warner Cable also managed to lobby through a bill at the state level that restricts municipal networks’ ability to expand. After a 2015 preemption effort by the FCC and then a reversal by the...

Residents and businesses in Rangely and Meeker are starting to feel the speed of the Rio Blanco County Broadband Project. The network is now offering fiber connectivity to the northwest Colorado towns.

Options At Last

The network brings choice and speed to Rio Blanco County, reports the Herald Times:

In just three years, Meeker and Rangely have gone from having a single choice for limited bandwidth internet to multiple local companies offering some of the biggest bandwidth packages available in the nation.

Subscribers have the option to choose between two providers which are offering services via the open access infrastructure. Local Access Internet (LAI) and Cimarron Telecommunications are both local providers that began offering wireless Internet access to subscribers before the project commenced. LAI also offers technical troubleshooting for PCS, laptops and cell phones.

Both companies offer symmetrical Gigabit Internet access (1,000 Megabits per second download and upload) for $70 per month. They match each others’ prices on two lower tiers also: $40 per month for 25 Mbps download / 5 Mbps upload and $55 per month for 100 Mbps download and 25 Mbps upload. Cimarron and LAI still offer fixed wireless packages.

We spoke with Bob Knight at Cimarron who told us that the 100 Mbps / 25 Mbps tier was the most popular with their subscribers, who are often families that run multiple devices simultaneously. While businesses are requesting the service, residents who have had little options except expensive and unreliable satellite are clearly hungry for better Internet access.

Bob was quick to point out that he expects the network to be an enticing economic development tool in Rio Blanco County. He says the quality of life is already good there and pointed out that there is ample hiking, fishing, biking, and other outdoor recreation. With high-quality Internet access, he hopes to see more entrepreneurs and families looking for clean air and beautiful country.

How Did They Get To Here?

In 2014, Rio Blanco County...