Small Town Builds Its Own Gigabyte Network; Cost To Citizens $57/month

An anonymous reader writes "On Thursday, the board of O-Net gave approval for residents to get access to [full gigabit bandwidth] for the same price that they currently pay for a guaranteed download speed of 100 megabits per second — $57 to $90 a month, depending on whether they have bundled their internet with TV and phone service. ... the town realized that it couldn't attract technology-based businesses and that bandwidth was a challenge even to ordinary businesses. It came up with a plan — it would install a fibre network throughout the town that would connect to the larger inter-community network being built by the government at that time — the Alberta Supernet."

Comments

City not named in Summary

[decipher_saint]

Olds, Alberta
(Population eight thousand)

Getting high speed internet in Alberta anywhere outside a larger population centre has been virtually impossible, so it's interesting to see rural towns take the problem by the horns on their own with success.

Re:never happen in the states

[h4rr4r]

I thought government was inefficient and can't do anything right? How would a super efficient private company ever have trouble competing?

These folks need to get their stories straight.