Princeton, Massachusetts, continues to move steadily forward with its municipal broadband initiative. We first reported on the community's plans in the Spring of 2012. The community approved funding for design services in May and recently hired G4S Technology to design the FTTH network for municipal government, schools and residents.

The Digital Journal reports:

The design will take into consideration more than 1,350 homes situated on Princeton’s 80.62 miles of road resulting in more than 425,600 feet of fiber optic cable. It will encompass access to all homes, including those set back from the road and those with underground utility services. A small number of Princeton homes located on Route 140 that rely on electrical services provided by the town of Sterling will be excluded from the completed design.

“We are excited to work on the design phase of this project with the town of Princeton,” said Bob Sommerfeld, President of G4S Technology. “We believe bringing broadband into smaller communities across the state will make a tremendous impact on economic growth, education and public safety. Community members will also enjoy the speed, reliability and convenience that high-speed broadband services will provide them on a daily basis at their schools, libraries, offices and homes.”

The design will be developed this summer anticipating a town vote this fall based on the design. A two-thirds vote will be required at a special town meeting and will ask the voters to borrow funds for the project.

CapeNet is officially open throughout Cape Cod. Cape Cod Today reports Governor Deval Patrick, President of Massachusetts' Senate Therese Murray, and State Senator Dan Wolf spoke on June 14th at an official event titled "This Changes Everything."

Planning for the new fiber network began seven years ago as a joint idea between Cape Cod Community College and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. In addition to $8 million in state, county, and CapeNet contributions, the project received a $32 million stimulus award. The network spans 37 towns along its 350 mile trail. According to the CapeNet website, community anchor institutions will include 30 libraries, five colleges, and six research facilities. Approximately 62,000 businesses will have the ability to connect.

Community members in Princeton, Massachusetts, voted on May 14th to proceed with planning for a next-generation fiber network. The picturesque New England community voted to spend $10,000 on a system design and to establish an entity to operate the network in the future, if the community decides to proceed with the investment.

According to News Telegram story, the question passed by more than the required two-thirds majority at 274-61.

Earlier this year, the Princeton Broadband Committee distributed a survey to residents. Results showed the people of Princeton desperately want something better than existing DSL, satellite, wireless or dial-up. School's must now connect with expensive T1 connections and property values suffer due to the lack of broadband. Telecommuting is not an option in Princeton.

The design should be completed this summer, opening the way for the next step in the process. Voters will need to approve by a two-thirds majority a request to borrow funds and the establishment of the town broadband entity.

CapeCodToday, recently ran two interviews relating to OpenCape, the publicly owned network nearing completion in Massachusetts. The interviews follow a belated March press release from Comcast, announcing its new service contract with Cape Cod Community College (CCCC). Like some others familiar with the project, we were surprised to see the college choosing Comcast for connectivity instead of OpenCape.

As we previously noted, CCCC and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute were two OpenCape founding members in 2006. The nonprofit OpenCape received $32 million in a Broadband Technology Opportunity Program (stimulus) award and gathered an additional $8 million in funds from the state, the county, and CapeNet, the company building and operating the network.

Regarding the delay in publicity, the College was not willing to comment on the connection, including statements to Comcast itself, until we had actively used it for a couple of months.

When the contract was negotiated, CCCC needed fiber service and OpenCape was not ready to serve them. Cox stated that the college needs to stay competitive and referred to a Bridgewater University satellite campus that will soon open in the community. Community colleges rely heavily on reliable connectivity as students look for distance learning opportunities.

The Massachusetts Broadband Initiative's (MBI) MassBroadband 123 network is becoming a reality. On March 28th, MBI lit up the first 35-mile stretch, linking Sandisfield, traveling through Otis, and connecting at the Springfield Technical Community College Technology Park hub. The inaugural connection was the first in a series of build outs that are scheduled to be completed by July 2013 [PDF of map and schedule].

MassBroadband 123 is the middle mile open access network snaking its way across central and western Massachusetts. The project, funded with $40 million in state bond proceeds and $45.4 million in stimulus funding, is scheduled to bring the 1,200 mile network to the anchor institutions in approximately 120 communities. While MassBroadband 123 will not offer last-mile connectivity to residents, it will bring the possibility to many rural areas that have little or no options today. Communities with their own networks, like Leverett, will be able to connect with MassBroadband 123. Hopes are that the open access nature of the network will inspire private providers to offer more last-mile connections.

MassLive.com reported on the first use of the network by school children in rural Otis. Kids at Farmington River Elementary School connected in Spanish with kids from Columbia and learned about physics from the NASA Goddard Space Fight Center in Maryland:

“It was really excellent,” said Mary G. Turo, principal of Farmington River Elementary, in a phone interview. 

...

“We are a little isolated,” Turo said. “Having the capability to bring the outside world to us, you cannot put a price on it. We want our kids to be ready for the future. In order to be ready to for the future they have to know what is going on outside their hometown .”

Judith Dumont, director of MBI, compares the expansion of the network to government efforts to expand electricity in the 1930s. From the article:

We recently reached out to Princeton, Massachusetts, after reading several local news articles about the city's ambition to improve broadband in the community. Phyllis Booth of the Landmark has been covering the story. Community leaders recently mailed survey cards to every residence in town and put the survey online to provide ample opportunity for feedback.

With survey results complied, the answer from respondents was an overwhelming, "Yes! We want better Internet!" The Princeton Broadband Committee has since made the results available in a series of visuals that express the community's experiences with speed, customer satisfaction, desirable applications, and other respondent concerns. Detailed survey results are available for review [PDF].

The results come as no surprise to Stan Moss, Board of Selectmen Member who is also on the Broadband Committee. "Everybody has tried everything," says Stan when he describes the survey outcome. The community of 3,300 has access to DSL in about 49% of households and other choices are satellite, dial-up, and wireless. According to Moss, Princeton DSL customers averaged a D+. From the Landmark article:

“Once we invest in the fiber it’s pretty good. It’s not costly to upgrade in the future, it’s reliable once it’s in place,” said [Broadband Committee Member John] Kowaleski. “If the town doesn’t do this, no one will,” he added. The town has contacted Verizon and Charter and “we’re not even on their plan,’’ said Kowaleski. “Princeton has insurmountable challenges. It isn’t profitable for Verizon or any other company to provide the infrastructure to give us the service,” said Kowaleski.

Moss says he receives calls on a regular basis from residents who want to know when the city is going to provide FTTH. Most of those calls come from people who work from home or have school age children.

Leverett, Massachusetts' broadband initiative has moved to the next phase in bringing fiber to residents. The town selectboard recently decided on a bidder to build the community owned network. G4S designed the network and also works with the Massachusetts Broadband Institute (MBI) as it brings a middle mile fiber network to towns across the western half of the state [PDF of service area].

An article in The Recorder alerted us to the development. Readers will recall that Leverett townspeople voted to ok a modest property tax increase as a way to help finance the ftth build out. From the article:

Indeed, after years of trying to convince private business to develop and offer high-speed telecommunication service in rural western Massachusetts, Leverett’s first-of-its kind network is being built with the help of a $40 million state bond, $47 million in federal stimulus funding and the town’s willingness to borrow to build infrastructure to attract service.

D’Errico said the cost of the project should be lower than $300 a year per median $278,000 property owner over 20 years.

...

...D’Errico said the $300 annual tax addition for the median value property is likely far lower than what residents are paying for their telephone, satellite dishes and cable service connections, and that having the town own the infrastructure likely means that the service contracts should also be a fraction of what they would cost otherwise.

Before construction can start, utility poles will need to be made ready for placement of the fiber optic cable. While this stage of the prep work is expected to take up to six months, hanging the cable would only take about three months.

We enjoy bringing you news from western rural Massachusetts and the WiredWest Cooperative. We want to share the update on 2012 activities and some of the plans for 2013.

Sixteen new towns became members in 2012, which brings the grand total to 42. Business planning progressed during 2012. From the WiredWest newletter:

Significant work was undertaken in 2012 to enable financing and buildout of the network. That work was made possible by grants from the Massachusetts Broadband Institute, Berkshire Regional Planning Commission and the Central Berkshire Fund, in addition to support from donations, Cooperative membership fees, and thousands of volunteer hours.

The group also conducted a market survey in member towns. WiredWest confimed that demand is strong in the region. The organization is using the information to determine what services to offer and to support pro-forma financial statements, developed with help from groups that know the ins and outs of community broadband:

WiredWest has created comprehensive pro-forma financial statements with input from other municipal fiber networks and appropriate financial expertise. The leadership team has met with a number of public and private financing sources and advisers to refine our financing strategy and put the project on track for financing in 2013.

In 2007, the City of Amherst, Massachusetts received a $150,000 grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) to build a wireless mesh network. DARPA and NSF have long been interested in developing mesh networks that are more resilient than traditional hub and spoke type networks.

The City IT Department, UMass Amherst Office of Information Technology Department, DARPA and NSF collaborated to deploy the network that now covers much of the city.

According to GazetteNet.com, the city is now investing another $50,000 to upgrade the system which now extends a mile through downtown. From the article:

“We definitely have the fastest and largest outdoor Wi-Fi network in the state,” said Information Technology Director Kristopher Pacunas.

The new system, which replaces aging equipment that was part of a smaller municipal Wi-Fi system, will be a boon to those who live, work and shop in downtown Amherst, said Pacunas, who anticipates as many as 2,000 different people will use the system daily.

“We’ve seen data in the short time we’ve had this (that) people will come to downtown areas with free Wi-Fi,” Pacunas said.

While the new upgrades were not officially launched until the start of 2013, Pacunas said that over 10,400 people used the system in the weeks leading up to the new year. Pacunas also notes that the network has limited functionality indoors, being designed mostly for public outdoor spaces downtown.

 The Town of Amherst Public WiFi website describes how the design was meant to blend in with the look of the city and the light and utility poles that house the access points. There are 30 wireless mesh access points and burst speeds up to 80 Mbps. This is another example of how a municipal network can create direct benefits AND indirect benefits simply through its implementation. Also from the article:

Alex Krogh-Grabbe, director of the Amherst Business Improvement District, said he sees the benefits of the system.

After six years in the making, the OpenCape network is soon to be delivering services. According to a Sandwich Wicked Local article, town selectmen were informed on December 6th that the Brockton-to-Plymouth stretch of the network will be activated before the end of 2012 for testing. We brought you detailed news of the $40 million project earlier this year.

Funded with a $32 million Broadband Technology Opportunity Program (BTOP) grant and $8 million from the state, county, and private venture firm CapeNet. According to the article, 200 miles of fiber are installed and 50 are in construction or are being leased. Construction was set back when Hurrican Sandy hit the east coast. Verizon NStar crews, working on the install, were all pulled and sent to New York and New Jersey.

The news from OpenCape Chief Executive Officer Dan Vortherms was welcome. The community has been waiting patiently to tap into the improved access, economic development, and cost savings. From the article:

Selectman Frank Pannorfi said broadband might service several initiatives the town has planned for some time; alluding perhaps to South Sandwich Village and its business potential.

“We’ve been waiting for this a long time,” Pannorfi said.

A much needed data center is just beginning construction. The data center and the network will belong to the non-profit OpenCape. The purpose of the middle-mile network is to "support the economic, educational, public safety and governmental needs of the region.