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Nation's First City-Wide WiFi Network Completed

Posted by timothy on from the depends-who's-defining-things dept.

According to a reader rockwellpa, Grand Haven, Michigan has recently completed the United States' first truly city-wide WiFi nework. According to the press release, "Other cities have announced intent to build similar networks or have announced partial deployments; in contrast, the Grand Haven implementation, by Ottawa Wireless Inc., is the first full and complete city-wide WiFi deployment in the country. 'As the first WiFi city in America, Grand Haven has truly lived up to its name in the Internet era, as we now allow anyone anywhere to connect to the Internet and roam the city and waterways in a completely secure computing environment'"

31 of 163 comments (clear)

  1. Public Access Locations by artlu · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Does anyone know the logistics of where they placed the access points? Were they connected to telephone polls or traffic lights? How about weather? Michigan does get snow and if the access points are outside, what type of protection do they have.
    Finally, if one access point crashes do the rest break as well?

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    1. Re:Public Access Locations by Syncrou · · Score: 5, Informative

      They attached them to telephone poles across the city. They're hoping to widen the range over the next couple of years. One cool thing: You can surf the web in your boat off the coast of Lake Michigan. I forget how far off the beach, but I want to try it.

    2. Re:Public Access Locations by wayward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Illinois also gets snow, though not as much as Michigan, so our community wireless project makes a point of waterproofing nodes. The card is enclosed in a really tough container, and they're using a combination of electrical tape and plumbers goo to waterproof the connections.

    3. Re:Public Access Locations by detritus. · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Here's a picture I took of one of the access points a few months ago. They are in NEMA weatherproof enclosures, with a support bar attached to an omnidirectional whip antenna (quite ugly - unfortunately I couldn't fit it all in the same picture). In addition, there's a flat directional antenna that obviously connects to another access point. I have also discovered the majority of the access points since they started to appear last fall, and have posted them to WiGLE .

  2. How does this affect local ISP? by rice0067 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I think the idea of city wide WIFI is nice, but how is it paid for? Do people still have cable modem at home? (or that silly phone line thing)
    With whole city wifi.. will people even use land lines for home telephone?

    1. Re:How does this affect local ISP? by Kphrak · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I would be against this sort of thing being provided by the local government. This is not the purpose of government.

      The local government is actually the perfect place for it if enough people in the city actually want it. There is nothing wrong with a small government, participated in at a local level, voting for a convenience for the city.

      Of course, the above is in a perfect world. City governments are often owned by special interests such as corporations, or even a local mafia -- both of whom try to get the voted-on service outsourced to themselves. In my city, the local city council often votes for the most expensive and least useful things it can get (right now, for instance, there's a movement to get a major league baseball team, and a multi-billion-dollar project to bury all the reservoirs in a knee-jerk reaction to 9/11 just got cancelled -- but not after spending 4 million dollars on preparation for it). It really depends on how involved the citizens of the city were in the decision.

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    2. Re:How does this affect local ISP? by sadler121 · · Score: 2, Informative

      The question is: Will the Telcos allow such a thing to happen?

      I know in Utah, (of all places where the vile Orin Hatch is elected into office by Republician Religious sheep (yeah yeah, Flamebait I know)), both the local phone company (QWest) and Comcast are loobying HARD in the Utah legeslature to stop UTOPIA (a coallition of local cities to impliemnt FTTH).

      bout the only good thing Provo is doing is implimenting there own seperate FTTH system that is a basis for the more generalized UTOPIA FTTH that other Utah cities are attempting to impliment.

  3. Releasing viruses into the wild... by NeoGeo64 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This town will soon become a favorite stop for people looking to anonymously release viruses into the wild.

  4. LOL by Beuno · · Score: 5, Funny

    "completely secure computing environment". Hahhahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahaha... *whipes tears*

  5. Is it me, or is this service really... by iammaxus · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... slow. If you go to http://www.ottawawireless.net/services/pricing.htm l, you see that they offer 256kbps for regular users. That's only about 5 times dialup. With modern websites, that really doesnt cut it.

    1. Re:Is it me, or is this service really... by mrscorpio · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't know, but if I needed this service, I'd probably still have my cable internet at home for all my downloading and stuff. This is just going to let me conduct my business activities anywhere.

  6. Breaking monopoly by usefool · · Score: 3, Informative

    always-on broadband Internet starts at $19.99 for 256 kbps, and unlimited mobile VoIP calling is $29.99

    In countries where there is only one telo, this kind of deployment might be one way to get around the telephone grid and compete in the once-me-only market.

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  7. Not True by JonahDark1 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Aspen Colorado had the first city-wide WiFi Network running in 1997. It was a private network built by Sun Microsystems. It was running 802.11 (not a/b/g) at 2Mbps.

  8. No Kidding! by DaedalusLogic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Isn't it inherently insecure since the public can access it? What are they going to do... register MAC addresses of adapters? What are they going to do when those are spoofed? I think that wide ranging public access to the internet via 802.11 anything is a bad idea. Is anyone else with me on this? What's the motivation for doing this to an entire town?

  9. Haven for Computer Crime by iendedi · · Score: 4, Funny

    In other news, Grand Haven, Michigan has been experiencing an unusually large growth rate in specialty computer stores, comic book stores and other geeky novelty stores. Asked about this unusual growth, mayor Gaven Hrand replied, "We don't understand it either, but we have noticed that most of the operators of these stores know each other and lug around quite a bit of equipment when they aren't watching their shops."

    On an unrelated but also interesting note, the FBI recently decided to place a district office in Grand Haven, citing the nice weather.

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  10. Network Neighborhood? by moankey · · Score: 4, Funny

    So how many computers will be cached up in my network neighborhood under "Workgroup" or "MSHome"?

  11. Vague press release by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 2, Insightful
    The press release seems rather lacking. It doesn't say anything about whether the intention of this project was to get wireless into homes or residential areas or not. It only cites an area of 6 square miles as the goal. Was this in residential, government, or business areas? Is this the entire city limits or a small portion? Is it only in public areas (streets, parks & goverement buildings)? Are there holes in the coverage? 'Citywide' could mean that a significant areas is covered across the city but that there might still be significant gaps in the coverage.

    I for one am unimpressed. The press release is simply too ambiguous.

    1. Re:Vague press release by scottking · · Score: 3, Informative

      this answered a lot of the questions i had...http://www.walkersands.com/Grand-Haven-WiFi- FAQ.htm what kinda web publisher puts the FAQ at the top, above the title in "ad space"?

      makes it very skippable.

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      scott king
  12. Modern Websites Requiring More than 256kbps need.. by DaedalusLogic · · Score: 2, Funny

    New developers... Well actually I guess there is an exception, and from that I can infer that you're browsing for a whole lotta porn!

  13. Not so fast by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I live in Chaska Minnesota and we have had city run wifi internet access for a few months now. It's run by the City and it costs $15.99 a month. If you'd like more information, check out http://www.chaska.net/

  14. I doubt it. by twitter · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Anonymous? I don't think so. It's not a free service, so I imagine they have a client that identifies the user for billing purposes. That's no more anonymous than dialup or cable operations. Nor are those other more expensive alternatives any more secure. As the waves of spam, virus and malware continue to be released without any accountability at all, it's clear that all commercial and government attempts to follow users around only affect honest people. Real criminals have armies of broken Windoze boxes on cable modem services to do their bidding.

    The problem is not wifi or the internet, it's Windoze.

    --

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  15. Not even the second by voidref · · Score: 3, Informative

    Half Moon Bay, in California was had this at least a year ago, and there was even a story on the Science Channel about it!

  16. Big deal! by MSBob · · Score: 2, Informative

    Fredericton (capital of Canadian province of New Brunswick) has WiFi acces throughout the city and best of all it's free! http://www.muniwireless.com/archives/000169.html

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    Your pizza just the way you ought to have it.
  17. Free as in.... by microcars · · Score: 3, Informative
    "...Monthly prices for always-on broadband Internet starts at $19.99 for 256 kbps, and unlimited mobile VoIP calling is $29.99.
    Connections up to 1 Mbps and per-day pricing options are also available."

    RTFA

    --
    I like microcars
  18. Free wifi? Already have that! by slashname3 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Free wifi is already available. Just connect to your neighbors wifi and surf the Internet over his cable connection. Works great and it is free.

    At least until they catch on and setup encryption, but then that can be broken given a little time.

  19. First? by Anonymous+Freak · · Score: 2, Informative

    Lots of small cities/town have done this.


    Hermiston, Oregon (popultion about 13,000, a litte larger than Grand Haven,) has had this for over a year. Newsweek even proclaimed that town the most Unwired back in June.


    Oh, I see. Because it's not done by the city of Hermiston, but rather covers the entire 600 square-mile county, it's just the first county, not the first city. After all, Grand Haven only covers *SIX* square miles, not six hundred.


    The second phase is just finishing, which will add another 200 square miles, and another seven cities. So maybe being the first 'seven city area' doesn't qualify each of the seven to be the 'first city', as Grand Haven is claminig.


    Psh. Just some grandstanding. Being the first to claim you're first does not mean you are first.

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  20. Re:Dear moderators by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Not to mention he posted it just to show his GroupShares spam ad.

    artlu@artlu.net

    Eric Karch
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    Heh, the IP his site resolves to reverse-resolves to some Miami bail bonds company.

    Of course, seeing as how the company is in Florida, it would not be wise for anyone to do business with stock scam artists.

  21. First? Not even close... by kennybain · · Score: 3, Informative

    I see the post referencing my deployments in LA & TX - thanks Entity1633. Actually - not to toot my own horn, there are several towns in this region of the US that have city-wide WiFi. In addition to the TWO citywide Fastline http://www.fastlineinternet.com/ networks that have been running for over a year now(Vivian, LA & Linden, TX) another group NETWI http://www.netwi.org/ has deployed city-wide WiFi across Queen City & Atlanta, Texas. NETWI are working on other cities in East Texas. In addition, there are at least three other WISP's in this region actively deploying citywide WiFi. All of us use LocustWorld software & off-the-shelf hardware. Still, I applaud these guys. What they have done is to be commended.

  22. Not because it isn't profitable... by taped2thedesk · · Score: 2
    (and a few other things like social services that no one else would do because its not profitable.) Like education.

    Uh... I believe the purpose of public education was to make sure everyone had access to education, not because it wasn't profitable. There are plenty of private schools that do/could make a fortune if they wanted to. (Especially in areas where the public schools aren't so great) It's also the same idea that's behind universal health care - it's a basic need that everyone should have access to regardless of income, and there are plenty of private hospitals that are making a ton of money.

  23. RIAA will shut this down by f0rt0r · · Score: 2, Funny

    The day after the City-wide Wlan was completed, it was shut down under a court injunction in response to a complaint the RIAA filed stating "Some part of this network may possible one day maybe used to for illegal sharing of copyrighted filed." When asked for proof, an RIAA official was cited as saying "I found a file called Mike_Jackson.doc on a wireless users 'My Shared Documents' folder, and most likely it is a cleverly renamed mp3 file of a Michael Jackson track."

    When we asked a judge why the court responded to the complaint so quickly without due process, all we got was a "no comment" as he climbed into a new Mercedes Benz vehicle with license plate that read "luvriaa".

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  24. Roaming? by skaag · · Score: 2, Interesting

    How do these guys handle roaming? What happens when I move out of one access point and into another? Anyone here has an idea what happens (or lives in Grand Haven and can give us all a report from first hand experience?)

    I want to start an underground movement in my country where people all grant access to their accesspoints to the public, but then without roaming it's kinda silly.

    Thanks! :-)

    Skaag

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