New Orleans decided last fall to convert its Tropos-based WiFi public service network, used for emergency personnel, into a free Wi-Fi service. But, as USA Today recounts this week, it has ruffled the feathers of BellSouth which says the city’s network is illegal.
The city got around the state-wide ban on municipal wireless because the governor declared a state of emergency after Hurricane Katrina. But the state of emergency is expected to be lifted this year.
When that happens, the broadband network would have to shut down:
Within weeks, “BellSouth was in here asking us when we were going to wind it down,” Meffert recalls. “We told them we couldn’t do that.”
More than 10,000 people are using the service. Among them: police officers, law firms, restaurants, bars and coffee shops. EarthLink will keep providing the service for free, but plans to sell faster premium services in time.
BellSouth recently announced plans to merge with AT&T. When the $67 billion deal closes, AT&T will become the USA’s biggest telecom with more than $120 billion in annual revenue.
Jeff Battcher, a BellSouth spokesman, says that his company has spent “tens of millions of dollars” repairing the local network, “which any Wi-Fi network would rely on.”
Determined to keep the Wi-Fi network humming, Meffert, who works in the mayor’s office, last week reached out to EarthLink.
The result: EarthLink plans to take over the city’s Wi-Fi network, with the goal of spending around $15 million in the next three years to build out the network to a 15-to-20-mile radius around the city.
“We really feel for the city,” says Donald Berryman, president of EarthLink’s municipal networks. “They’re still basically at a crawl in terms of communications there.”
City officials are using Sony’s SNC-RZ30N cameras as the “eyes” of their original wireless system, and backboning them with wireless and fiber. Sony’s IP cameras feature remote-controlled pan/tilt/zoom, a 25X optical zoom lens, day/night and wireless capabilities. They can read a license plate from hundreds of feet. Images captured on the street are digitized and sent via the city’s network to a main server archive for Internet-based monitoring from any location - whether it’s police headquarters or a patrol vehicle.
Chris Drake, who works for the Mayor’s Office of Technology in New Orleans, tells DailyWireless;
“I built our Surveillance Camera project where we are running dozens of Sony IP cameras on a mostly wireless network all over the city. I now manage our public safety interoperable communications project for a four Parish (county) area. I am pushing hard for a WiMax solution.”
The New Orleans cloud was developed with the help of Active Video Solutions (New Orleans) and Southern Electronics (New Orleans), with Verge Wireless Networks (New Orleans) acting as the integrator and installer. The city has set up a Web site (www.iseecrime.com) which allows citizen groups, neighborhood organizations, businesses, churches and other community organizations to adopt a camera. The program allows organizations to pay for a camera and place that camera in a location of their choice.
Earthlink will start adding Motorola and Tropos hardware to the existing infrastructure in New Orleans. They’ll serve two audiences with the enhanced network:
- Residents - We’ll provide a 15 square mile zone of free wireless access at 300 kbps (upload and download) for the residents of New Orleans. This network will make it easier for them to do things like communicate with friends and relatives in the outside world, schedule appointments, find grants and government aid programs, and connect with essential city services. Once hardware providers bring Wi-Fi phones to the U.S. market, this could also bring affordable telephone service to tens of thousands of people currently without it.
- Commercial - We’ll also provide a premium 1 megabit service throughout the city primarily for the 140,000+ city workers and businesses. That service should cost users around $20 per month.
DailyWireless has more on New Orleans/BellSouth including New Orleans’ Wireless Cameras, BellSouth Extends WiMax, Dubious Achievements 2005, New Orleans Announces “Free” Cloud, and BellSouth in New Orleans with Navini.
