Round up of the Broadband Communities Summit 2012

If you were not able to attend the 2012 Broadband Communities Summit in Dallas a couple of weeks ago, you missed a great conference. With an increased focus on both community broadband and open access networks, there were a lot of really good, solid session, especially the five sessions on open access, which I helped to organize.

Here are some of the key ideas, concepts, and take-aways that I noted from the conference:

• Micro duct vendor Teraspan noted that 2500 feet of day of microtrenching is easily possible in city streets.
• Jim Salter of Atlantic Engineering gave a lively talk, and noted that communities could expect a 40% drop in telecom costs because of shared networks. He said telecom prices in the U.S barely budged because of duplicated networks.
• Joe King, the City Manager of the City of Danville, Virginia, talked about the success of that community's open access, active Ethernet fiber network, which was started to spur economic development. The fiber has brought businesses back downtown, including international businesses and a commercial supercomputer facility.
• The Grant, Washington Public Utility District deployed community fiber to help rural communities, and the combination of affordable power and affordable fiber has brought seven server farms/data centers to one community in the PUD service area.
• The Grant PUD fiber network is open access, and has 23 providers offering a wide variety of services. The Metronet Zing network has 30 providers. This utterly refutes the idea that open access networks can't attract providers.
• The St. Joe Valley Metronet project noted that lack of affordable fiber stunts economic growth.
• The open access Utopia network in Utah covers 25% of the state's population, making it the largest open access network in the country. And it has five different video providers on network.
• The City of Eagan, Minnesota has found the combination of open fiber and a data center is powerful job attractor. And Eagan thinks community fiber is crucial to help preserve scare right of way.
• Kate McMahon gave a talk on planning and noted that unless city and town planners update policies specifically to address modern right of management, local governments will continue to mis-manage right of way. She noted that many planners avoid the issue by claiming "that's not our policy," but don't work with elected officials to revise those policies.
• Chris Mitchell noted that the supposed awfulness of community broadband "competing" with the private sector is a red herring argument, as many other muni services "compete" with the private sector, and no one complains about that--should libraries be closed because they compete with bookstores?
• Rick Smith of the City of Cortez says they opened up their fiber to leverage the excellent quality of life in southwestern Colorado, noting that the fiber helps attract businesses and entrepreneurs to smaller towns.
• David Shaw of Kirton & McConkie noted that three things are necessary for a successful community broadband project: political support, legal expertise, and excellent business and financial planning.

There was much much more, but those are some of the highlights. Start planning now to attend next year's conference.