The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
The race for high speed
Faster internet connections seen as key to economic future
The race is on to expand high-speed internet service across the country.
Stamford-based Charter Communications has emerged as a leader in the broadband industry, as it has connected millions of customers across the nation in recent months to superfast “gigabit” service. In Connecticut, public officials are also pushing ahead with a number of rapid-connection initiatives, which they argue are engines of economic growth. But these programs must tackle significant challenges — including recent regulatory changes — to fulfill their potential.
“Gigabit is the future,” said Sudip Bhattacharjee, a professor in the University of Connecticut’s business school and chief of the U.S. Census Bureau’s Center for Big Data Research. “Any business that needs extremely fast internet connections will benefit. And it will be a huge asset for any cities or towns here in Connecticut.”
Embracing gigabit
Last month, Charter announced it had established 1 gigabit per second connections with its Spectrum Internet Gig service in eight markets covering about 8.8 million customers’ homes.
The term “gig” refers to internet speeds of 1 gigabit per second. One gigabit equals 1,000 megabits. Nationally, internet speeds average about 9 megabits per second, by some measures
Charter officials said in a statement the service would help customers to quickly stream video, play online games, download music and do other activities on multiple devices without sacrificing broadband quality.
The company declined to comment for this article.
A second group of markets — Austin, Texas; Charlotte, N.C.; Cincinnati; Kansas City, Mo.; New York City; Raleigh-Durham, N.C.; and San Antonio — joined Oahu, Hawaii, Charter’s first gigabit area, which launched in late November.
In 2018, Internet Gig is set to launch in additional cities across Charter’s 41state footprint. The company has not disclosed those planned locations.
“I think that they want to basically provide this service in high-concentration cities, where they may consider this to be economically viable,” said Ramesh Subramanian, a professor of information systems at Quinnipiac University.
Going high speed in the Nutmeg State
In Connecticut, 72 percent of internet connections ran at speeds of more than 10 MBPS in the first quarter of 2017, ranking 10th among the states, according to a report by technology firm Akamai. The rate represented a 13-point improvement over the level from one year earlier.
But many want to further develop fiber-optic systems that support high-speed service, to encourage more private-sector competition and fill in gaps in communities underserved by broadband providers.
Launched in 2014, the CT Gig Project comprises a coalition of local and state public officials and other interested parties who want to bring high-speed, lowcost internet to residents and businesses throughout the state.
CT Gig does not provide funding for municipalities to develop their internet infrastructure, but it represents an important advocate and source of expertise and contacts for communities looking to upgrade their broadband systems. The state’s Office of Consumer Counsel oversees the initiative.
“We want to have the best infrastructure and best available technology,” said Elin Swanson Katz, the state’s consumer counsel. “Right now, we don’t have ubiquitous fiber-optic-tothe-home access in any community. But we have the intellectual capital, and we have demand for it.”
More than 100 towns and cities have expressed interest in creating “openaccess” gigabit service, according to Katz’s office.
Stamford has emerged as one of the state’s leading cities for high-speed internet access. Companies based in the city have cumulatively invested millions of dollars to connect their buildings to gigabit fiber lines.
City officials, meanwhile, have been working with several internet service providers — including Frontier Communications and Altice — to expand the area’s gigabit infrastructure. Among key initiatives, the city plans to install public gigabit Wi-Fi connections within a half-mile of the downtown Metro-North station by the end of June.
Some $360,000 in “Innovation Places” funds that Stamford has received from the CTNext economic development agency will support the project. The nonprofit Stamford Partnership is also supporting the endeavor.
“Stamford’s gigabit broadband infrastructure, with its faster speeds, reliable service and low latency is our central platform to help spur innovation,” said Thomas Madden, the city’s economic development director. “With the ability for talent and capital to flow throughout the world, it is important that we continue to look toward the future
“I think that they want to basically provide this service in high-concentration cities, where they may consider this to be economically viable.”
Ramesh Subramanian, a professor of information systems at Quinnipiac University
and invest in our innovation infrastructure.”
Equal access for all?
Amid the push by the likes of Charter to expand gigabit access, high-speed internet service still languishes as a faint hope for many residents and businesses in low-income urban neighborhoods and rural areas in Connecticut and across the U.S.
In the first quarter of 2017, the U.S. ranked 10th worldwide in average megabit speeds, at 18.7, compared with an average of 28.6 in No. 1 South Korea, according to the Akamai report.
“The large and populous cities will definitely benefit in the short run,” Subramanian said of gigabit expansion. “But it would still likely leave small and less populous rural areas out in the cold . ... They may not even get the basic minimum speeds to qualify as broadband. Unless the companies are able to show a long-term strategy or proposal for expanding gigabit networks, these localized gigabit networks will not help large segments of the country.”
The Federal Communications Commission’s repeal last month of “net neutrality” rules that had regulated how broadband providers deliver and charge for content has further heightened concerns about access.
Net neutrality supporters argue the regulations were needed to ensure large internet service providers would treat all web traffic equally and protect free speech. Among other arguments, they said many firms could risk facing content slowdowns or additional charges for unobstructed broadband access.
“If companies like Charter create a ‘road tax’ to use the internet highway, then that is going to cause an issue with innovation,” said UConn’s Bhattacharjee. “If it costs too much to hop onto the high-speed internet, a lot of people will be negatively affected by it.”
Charter and Norwalk based Frontier backed the elimination of net neutrality. Officials at both companies said they would not hit customers with new charges or restrict access.