Google 1 Gbps Network Applicants Include Cities Big and Small

A wide array of municipalities are seeking to host a super-fast broadband network to be built by Google (CD Feb 11 p1), our survey found. They range in population from a suburb of Washington with 11,200 people to Los Angeles, applying for portions of the city. New York isn’t applying. Responses to the company’s request for information to build a 1 Gbps network in one or more areas with a total of 50,000 to 500,000 people numbered more than 600, Google said Friday. Applications were due at day’s end.

Most applications were made by individual communities. Google executives indicated to Assistant City Manager Brian Moura of San Carlos, near the company’s headquarters and home to some company employees, that they preferred individual applications, he said. “It sounds like they'll do fiber in one or two cities” after sorting through the responses, he said. “I think it’s more of a laboratory learning kind of experience, at least at the moment."

"I think there are going to be a lot of disappointed applicants,” similar to the NTIA’s Broadband Technology Opportunities Program, said municipal lawyer Nicholas Miller of Miller & Van Eaton. “Google is really looking for testbeds rather than a nationwide deployment strategy.” Miller is “as surprised as everyone” at the number of applicants, “but it does show how unhappy and unsatisfied local government is with the status quo."

"This enthusiasm is much bigger than Google and our experimental network,” Product Manager James Kelly wrote Friday on the company’s blog. More than 190,000 people have asked for their community to get the testbed, he said. “We're thrilled to see this kind of excitement,” which shows people nationwide “want better and faster Internet access.” The company will disclose its decisions by year’s end, he said. A spokesman wouldn’t disclose the names of applicants.

Silicon Valley was amply represented among communities seeking the network. Those who have applied or are likely to include Burlingame, Cupertino -- home to Apple -- and Palo Alto, said Moura. His community is applying as are many others part of the 18-municipality San Mateo County Telecommunications Authority, on whose board he sits. Sixty percent of clients of Miller at Miller & Van Eaton, a law firm representing municipalities, are likely to apply, he said. Since it’s a RFI and not a legal filing, many applicants don’t appear to be hiring law firms to complete them, but some are discussing it with him and speaking with consultants, Miller said.

Wilmington, N.C., in partnership with New Hanover County, will complete the application before the deadline, Mayor Bill Saffo told us. The city stands out because of its trend of testing innovative technology, he said, noting it was the first where most full-power broadcasters switched to DTV. The city’s application emphasized its previous and ongoing innovative technology initiatives, said Larry Bergman, the city’s information technology director. The application has two parts: The joint city/county application and the community-submitted support, he said. Google wants to find places where it can deploy as quickly as possible, Bergman said.

Some big cities are sitting out the application-fest. New York won’t file one due to Google’s preference to offer services to communities with as many as 500,000 people, said a spokeswoman for the city’s Economic Development Corporation. The city supports an application from the Hudson Square Connection there, she said. The connection is “coming from a different angle” as the application was based on businesses in Hudson Square, home to more than 20,000 people, said President Ellen Baer. She said many people in that area work for media, communications and other innovative companies.

Falls Church, Va., is a manageable location for Google to test the broadband network and it made an application, said Chairman David Tarter of the Falls Church Economic Development Authority. The 2.2 square-mile city of 11,200 has a highly educated population, many working for the federal government, he said. It’s among the communities best connected to cable and wireless services, City Manager Wyatt Shields said. Nearby Alexandria, another applicant, said current broadband providers face little competition and Google can help push all providers to cut prices. Montgomery and Prince George’s counties and Baltimore and Rockville are among the Maryland jurisdictions applying. A spokeswoman for Washington, D.C., didn’t reply to a message seeking comment about whether it applied.

Hawaii prepared a collaborative bid with all four counties there to work with Google. “A Google ‘Fibers for Communities’ project in Hawaii will unite these two global brands into an attractive and compelling platform to demonstrate the benefits of ultra-high speed broadband,” said Governor Linda Lingle. The partnership will provide the company a “one-stop” interface to facilitate regulatory and permitting requirements and the state and county governments are prepared to provide regulatory relief where possible to facilitate deployment, Hawaii said.