Residents of tiny Vergennes, Michigan a small community east of Grand Rapids, is taking matters into their own hands to solve their lack of broadband. They’re using “white space” radios from Carlson Wireless, combined with lightly licensed 3.65 WiMax and cellular microcells reports Dailywireless.
Ryan Peel, owner of Vergennes Broadband has been continuously frustrated with the lack of broadband access. Peel’s solution according to the article is to combine three different technologies to extend wireless broadband coverage in his community: WiMAX at 3.65 GHz; TV white space radios; and micro-cell mini-towers to extend cellular phone coverage as well. It’s currently being constructed.
“There’s going to be a hybrid network”, explains Peel. “The primary technology will be WiMAX using 3.65 GHz semi-licensed band. It’s going to use WiMAX radio technology with 6x diversity. But there are a significant number of people in the area that WiMAX cannot reach, because of the terrain and tree cover as is the nature of rural America”, Peel told the blog.
Vergennes Broadband uses two 100+ foot towers, each with a WiMAX radio and a Carlson TV white space radio called the RuralConnect IP. The software-defined radio uses the slivers of VHF and UHF spectrum not used by television broadcasters Dailywireless says.
According to the article, Peel is adding supplemental value to the project by offering femtocells. Femtocells provide a local cellular connection and use broadband for the backhaul. It simply plugs into customers’ new Internet connection to work.
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The plan seems like a kludge with a mix of three technologies. However, Comcast (CMCSA) and Charter are never going to do a build-out in rural areas. The Internet plans costs are
512 Kbps $39.99
1 Mbps $49.99
2 Mbps $59.99
3 Mbps $79.99
This was a problem that RUS Obama-money was supposed to address, but that has gone so well. Maybe Merit can do it.
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.