Tag: "churchill communications"

A Fiber Oasis in Nevada

Posted February 15, 2021 by Sean Gonsalves

There’s more to Nevada than sparkling casinos and vast expanses of arid desert. A six-hour drive north of Las Vegas – about an hour drive east of Reno on I-80 – is Churchill County.

Thanks to an irrigation system fed by the Walker, Truckee, and Carson Rivers, Fallon – the county seat – has long been known as the “Oasis of Nevada,” surrounded by abundant agricultural land with over 600 farms spread across Churchill County’s 5,000 square miles.

Two weeks before Christmas of 2020, county officials were celebrating a different kind of growth when CC Communications broke ground on a new headquarters that will consolidate the 132-year-old telecommunications company’s administrative, network, and customer service operations under one roof.

County Commission Chairman Pete Olsen praised CC Communications for putting the county on the proverbial map because of the Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network the county-owned company launched in 2015.

“This is a step on the path towards continuing to build out an amazing home-grown company inside Churchill County,” Olsen said. “It’s an incredible story. We’re so lucky to have this business here in our community, and it’s county owned.”

It was in 2008 that CC Communications first began construction of its $40 million FTTH network, lighting up its first gigabit customer in 2015. Today, Olsen reported, more than 85% of the homes and businesses in Churchill County now have access to the network and get broadband, VoIP and TV services. The residential price for a 100/10 Megabits per second (Mbps) connection is $50 a month; 150/50 Mbps for $70 a month; 250/50 Mbps for $100 month; and a 1Gbps/100Mbps connection for $300 a month. 

The current take rate is about 70%, CC Communications CEO Mark Feest told us last week. Feest said the take rate would be higher but there is a segment of the population who simply cannot afford the service. He said he is hopeful that the new Biden Administration will help improve...

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Muni, Co-op, And Tech Company Make A Broadband Bingo In Nevada

Posted March 9, 2017 by Lisa Gonzalez

Residents and businesses in rural regions between Reno and Las Vegas recently learned that their odds at obtaining high-quality Internet access just went through the roof. A collaboration between county owned Churchill County Communications (CC Communications), the Valley Communications Association of Pahrump (VCA), and Switch technology company to deploy a middle mile fiber-optic backbone will open up a range of possibilities for rural communities along the U.S. Highway 95. The route runs north and south along Nevada's far west, passing through a number of small towns that are welcoming the new alliance.

A Backbone Running North And South

For the past 11 months, CC Communications and the VCA have been working to deploy more than 450 miles of fiber from north to south. Switch provided funding for the deployment to link its data centers in Las Vegas and the Tahoe-Reno area and will also provide funding for expansion to some rural communities. VCA will service the network in the south and Churchill will care for the north section.

Along the backbone, CC Communications and VCA will connect local communities. Beatty, in southern Nevada, plans to be the first use the new infrastructure and to deploy fiber in the community. The unincorporated community is home to about 1,000 people and is about 120 miles northwest of Las Vegas. According to Valley Electric Association, the rural electric cooperative that owns and operates VCA, they have plans to expand fiber throughout the Beatty community.

“With that backbone, you can link up any town anywhere near it,” said Michael Hengel, spokesman for the Valley Electric Association. “The first all-fiber community in Nevada will be Beatty.”

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Like other rural electric utilities that have chosen to offer broadband, Valley Electric will be using its existing fiber resources initially installed for managing electric distribution for customer connectivity. The cooperative is currently offering fixed wireless Internet access with plans to offer...

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New Resource: Map, List Of Citywide FTTH Munis

Posted January 11, 2017 by Lisa Gonzalez

It’s no small feat to plan, deploy, and operate a municipal citywide Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network, but communities are doing it. We’ve put together a Citywide Municipal FTTH Networks list and a map, with quick facts at your fingertips. If your community is considering such an investment, this list can offer a starting point on discovering similarly situated locations to study.

The list is divided by state and each state heading offers a description of any barriers that exist and a link to the statute in question. Under each community, we also included relevant links such as to the provider’s website, coverage on MuniNetworks.org, and reports or resources about the network.

We used four basic criteria to put a community on our list and map:

  • The network must cover at least 80% of a city.
  • A local government (city, town, or county) owns the infrastructure.
  • It is a Fiber-to-the-Home network.
  • It is in the United States. 

Share the list far and wide and if you know of a community network that meets our criteria that we missed, please let us know. Contact H. Trostle at htrostle@ilsr.org to suggest additions.

Over 100 Years of Muni Telecom in Churchill County - Community Broadband Bits Podcast 204

Posted May 31, 2016 by Christopher Mitchell

For more than 100 years, Nevada's Churchill County has been operating its own telecommunications system, Churchill Communications. In recent years, they upgraded the vast majority of the county from copper to fiber offering a gigabit connection to the Internet. Churchill Communications General Manager Mark Feest joins us this week for Community Broadband Bits Episode 204.

We discuss the fascinating history behind their network and how they have built it without using any local taxpayer dollars.

Mark also explains two recent announcements that involve Churchill Communications offering its services in nearby areas where it already has some fiber. Finally, we discuss how some of the people that were originally skeptical of municipal networks have come around and are even asking Churchill Communications to expand.

Read the transcript from this show here.

We want your feedback and suggestions for the show-please e-mail us or leave a comment below.

This show is 18 minutes long and can be played below on this page or via iTunes or via the tool of your choice using this feed.

You can download this mp3 file directly from here. Listen to other episodes here or view all episodes in our index.

Thanks to Forget the Whale for the music, licensed using Creative Commons. The song is "I Know Where You've Been."

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