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Smart City Broadband Initiatives Part 3

November 20, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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This is part three of a three-part series. This has been taken from my upcoming book, Smart City Use Cases, with Smart City Development Notes.

City Strategies for a Broadband Initiative

There are several strategies for any city to start the initiative.

Do you want to undertake this effort? Is this something that you need for the city? Can you build a story around it?
1. Then do the research, get the buy-in, and lay out the options.
Weigh out your options to get started? This is the first step.
1. Will you do it yourself or gather partners?
2. If you partner, which you probably will, who do you reach out to? Think about whom it will benefit. It could help the universities and the local businesses. Start with them first because they have the most to gain. Broadband attracts business and talent, both of which help the local universities and cities.
3. Look at what’s been done. Are there groups, like Next Century Cities and Smart Cities Council, that you can reach out to for help? Are there other cities that would offer advice? Of course! Do some research and look them up.
Once you have a partner and maybe a high-level plan, then what?
1. Will you own the network?
2. Will you want local businesses to build out the network?
3. Will you offer incentives, like easing the permitting process, offering city assets, or other things to promote local business to deploy?

Let’s Review

Let’s review some lessons that Gig.U taught us. I am summarizing from their Next Gen Handbook found at http://www.gig-u.org/cms/assets/uploads/2016/12/next-gen-handbook-v2.pdf to help make this easier. (In my words.) I changed the order by what I thought would be more important. I explain what I think is important that somewhat aligns with Gig.U. I speak from case studies and my personal experience.

Community buy-in! This is essential to have the community buy-in and have stakeholders in the community that want this to happen. Local resources help things move and continue moving. The problem with partners and consultants is that if they don’t have the support of the community, the project will die a slow miserable and painful death. Don’t let this happen to your project! Find people and groups in the community that want this to happen as much as you do! Residents and especially local activist groups will make or break you. Get their buy-in and have them be supportive from day 1 to day 400. (Builds take a long time, well more than a few years, you will need all the help you can get to stay motivated.)
Local Leadership is critical! If you don’t have the local politicians on board, then it is an uphill battle. Even if you do have the local political leaders, who’s to say they will continue to support you without the local community and activist groups. Politicians are fickle. They will support you for 2 reasons. One – because they truly believe in the cause that high broadband will make residents and business happy and build a new business in their community. While this is great, very few have the vision to see it through, Philadelphia is a great example. When Earthlink was building out Philadelphia, the local politicians were as fickle as the win, and they certainly didn’t commit any money to the project. When the local unions complained, the politicians turned on Earthlink as quickly as the Philadelphia wind changed. (About 10 minutes for those of you wondering.) It takes great leadership to make this go through, like Mayor Bloomberg in NYC, he has the grit to see the greater good, unlike the group of politicians in Philadelphia who chose to shut the system down after it was built and operation due to lack of interest and money. In my opinion, they had no grit and preferred to be remembered as a failed system, which they blamed Earthlink, that innovators. They are leaving the innovation up to the residents, who innovate despite the local government.
It’s not enough to build a plan, but you need the story, budget and goals to be laid out clearly. The truth is the budget is a guess, an educated guess, but these things always take longer and seem to cost more than originally anticipated. BUT, you need to start somewhere. Build a vision of what you and your partners expect to happen. Be honest and show people what it takes. See if they have the stomach to work through it or if they will cower away and home the local cable company gets off its ass and build something without screwing the residents. It’s your call, but it takes grit, something that most city leadership does not have. They blame everything. They say we don’t have the money or what if it fails or what if the residents don’t want high-speed internet access. Listen, get partners to pay, it won’t fail, and who doesn’t want high-speed internet access? The government doesn’t pay for their access because the local taxes cover it, so they don’t care, do they? When they get home, they probably use a smartphone they got from work, again, paid for the local taxpayer. Most school kids don’t have that luxury, yet they don’t’ care, they have what they need, screw the other residents in that city. (My opinion here)
It’s hard to plan and execute! Yes, it is, again, grit and a get’re done attitude is needed.
In most cases, incumbents will react, not initiate! That is The local cable companies normally won’t do jack until they see a clear and present competitor. Examples are Nashville, TN, where AT&T and Comcast fought to keep Google Fiber off the poles. Then in College Station, TX, where Suddenlink put $250 Million aside to upgrade the network only after they saw a clear competitor in the local government who issued an RFP to build the local network. To be clear, Suddenlink didn’t announce anything until after the RFP hit the streets. The community wanted broadband in the worst way, Suddenlink didn’t do jack until the RFP was real, then it looks like they panicked and moved ahead. Sometimes a kick in the ass is needed to get these guys to listen to the community. Competition is just the kick in the ass they needed.
Did you do an audit? Most cities wait until after they initiate several consultants to do an audit. They should be proactive and see what they really have available ahead of time. Prior to the actual engagement of partners and consultants. However, they don’t. It adds time to the entire process. Just do it, audit what you have and align with the local utilities to see how they will cooperate with you on this venture. Let them be the heroes if that’s what it takes. Think of the residents, not yourself! What we need now is a team and to align with the local utilities is a great place to start and ask for buy-in. We need the residents, local businesses, and the local utilities to get this moving. Work to get their buy-in and resources to move ahead. If you need help, let me know. What you need to know is: 1) what assets do we have? 2) what assets do we have access to? 3) who can we partner with to make this happen? 4) what assets don’t we have, and can’t we touch? Don’t worry, the local ISPs and Cable Companies will clue you in, either in a good way or a horribly competitive way.
There are multiple solutions, pick one! I think you see here each city, municipality, town, or community has its own specific solution. If you’re looking for a “One size fits all” solution, good luck. It’s OK to see what others have done and copied it, but you will soon see that they all did something a little bit Pick you best plan to move forward then execute.
Be persistent and be nimble! It takes persistence to keep moving, but don’t be afraid to pivot and make changes. You will need to rely on the flexibility of your partners to keep things moving ahead. The only thing you should be rigid on is the result, not the way you deploy. You may need wireless to get some fiber blocks, so do it. You may need to gain access to some buildings to bypass some poles that the incumbents would not let you on, do it. Don’t hesitate to the point where it stops the project. Be nimble and open-minded. It takes some creativity to keep moving ahead. Be open in receiving suggestions.
It needs to be scalable and sustainable! Don’t forget that you will want to expand, so keep the option open to grow. It needs to be sustainable, do keep an eye on the payback. You want your income to cover the costs. If they don’t then next group of politicians will shut it down or make the deployment harder for contractors even if the locals get pissed. They won’t care if the system is bleeding money.
Don’t be afraid of failure. Sometimes you need to keep the dream

alive even if this didn’t work. Maybe a partner or local business could step in to make this dream a reality, maybe they know something you didn’t, so be open to accepting help.

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Smart City Broadband Initiatives Part 2

November 13, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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This is part two of a three-part series. This has been taken from my upcoming book, Smart City Use Cases, with Smart City Development Notes.

Facilitator

Where the city supports the rollout, maybe offers some rules and regulations that make it easier to get started and deploy, but otherwise, it hands off. Cities can still play a part in broadband development if they have companies in their area willing to take charge and make things happen.

East Lansing, Mi, has created the “Gigabit Ready” project which pulled in many groups like Michigan State University, Lansing Economic Act Partnership, various nonprofits, commercial property managers, and anyone else who would sign up. The goal was to roll out gigabit broadband, rather obvious, right? What did they do? They looked at the LEED program and thought, let’s do that for gigabit access. This lead to the creation of the Gigabit Certified Building Program, http://statenews.com/index.php/article/2012/07/msu_lansing_on_track_for_high_speed_internet, to set guidelines and requirements for buildings to add gigabit broadband. This helped Spartan-Net, (taken from the Michigan State Spartans I assume), to partner with DTN Management Co so they could roll out broadband across East Lansing and beyond!

Louisville, KY, worked with Louisville Fiber to create a website that allowed people to request gigabit service across Louisville. Why? So that lawmakers could see the need for speed, and it worked! Using the addresses they gathered, they built a layout of where the heaviest concentration was showing local officials the need. Louisville gave 20-year franchise agreements to BGN Networks, SiFi, and FiberTech. It also helped Louisville to be chosen as a potential Google Fiber City, (which means very little now).

College Station, TX, took a different approach. They put out an RFP to test the market. I personally hate this because when you’re on the other side, you do a lot of work that goes nowhere, but it served the city well because they got what they wanted. Suddenlink responded by promising to put in $250,000,000 into upgrading their network to make it gigabit capable, http://www.kbtx.com/home/headlines/GigaSpeed-Internet-Soon-to-be-Offered-in-BCS-276059641.html. Suddenlink got scared of having the government compete, so they got off their lazy ass and did something. College Station could motivate these guys into

action! It all worked out for the residents.

In North Carolina, the NCNGN, North Carolina Next Generation Network, formed a group of universities and cities. Wake Forest, University of North Carolina, Duke, and North Carolina State got together to work with Carrboro, Cary, Winston-Salem, Chapel Hill, Durham, and Raleigh to make this happen. This is a large group and has deep resources in knowledge, data, and money. Who saw this as an opportunity? AT&T moved in and started deploying fiber. Then, not to be left behind, Frontier Communications started their deployment. Finally, RST Fiber got rolling as well. Then Google started to deploy. Now you have all the competition to make it happen and affordable.

Connecticut did something similar where 46 communities all got together to host a gigabit conference to share their vision to become the first Gigabit state, https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2015/01/16/connecticut-could-be-first-gigabit-state2/.

Who buys broadband, really?

If we look at how broadband, gigabit especially is distributed, then what would we see? It takes a community. If one person wants it, too bad. If a community wants it and they want it bad, then it’s going to happen, eventually. That is something that the cable companies missed. They were so hell-bent on selling what they had that they could have missed this opportunity. They eventually were forced to upgrade and listen. Not they see the benefits of rolling out an all internet access system. They are going to save money on tariffs to run throughout the city. They are going to start scaling back their reliance on networks. They are going to let other providers deal with paying for network access and TV show. They are not stupid. They turned sour grapes into fine wine. Give them credit. They started looking at the big picture. At least Comcast did, and the others followed suit.

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Pricing matters!

Yes, it does! Gigabit broadband went from $7,000 a month to $70 a month in a matter of a few years. Good for consumers, tough on the provider. When we get gigabit out to the masses, it will eventually become a commodity, but you still need to get it to the people. It could be fiber or wireless. People are willing to pay, but the providers will need to offer more than just access. Years ago, it was video like TV shows and on-demand movies. Now it’s internet access, wired and wireless, and let the people choose what they want from there.

The thing was, we had to start, businesses needed broadband, and they got it. Then everyone else wanted it, and it is soon going to be everywhere. We need to be connected. The next question is how? Wired or wireless? While the smartphones are a part of our everyday lives, do they really need gigabit? Does our laptop or tablet need more than Wi-Fi? Ask yourself; my opinion changes too often.

What about Wi-Fi?

Well, we all love Wi-Fi. It is a value-add, right? Does it add value?

Well, Philadelphia and Seattle had failed Wi-Fi rollouts, highly publicized and ugly. Should we let this discourage is or should we learn from these disasters? I say we learn!

While I am a fan of what’s coming out soon, like the CBRS and expanded Wi-Fi, several cities have successful programs. Philly just didn’t have the commitment to do something like this. Luckily, they had Comcast who picked up the slack. Comcast did a great job in Philly, especially since the city had no intention of putting any money into it.

San Francisco and San Jose, Ca did a great job with their Hotspot 2.0, https://www.pcworld.com/article/2449160/free-wifi-networks-in-sf-san-jose-join-hands-through-hotspot-20.html, and Passpoint, https://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-certified-passpoint, programs, really the same program. This was a big win for Ruckus, but the cities new the residents needed connectivity, so they acted and provided what people can use in both cities by registering once.

Boston rolled out the “Wicked Free Wi-Fi” covering specific neighborhoods in an effort to increase downtown broadband usage. The city already has a fiber backbone, so why not extend it to the citizens via Wi-Fi?

Blacksburg Va has an amazing Wi-Fi system that was rolled out with crowdfunding by Techpad. Techpad is a local coworking and hacking community that raised $90,000 to make this happen.

Let’s not forget NYC, the city that rolled out Wi-Fi where the old telephone booths used to be. They put access points in every kiosk they put out. They give it away for free for tourists and residents to use to save on data usage on their smartphones. The LinkNYC project is the same as London’s LinkUK project. They both roll out the kiosks, which are really cool, have internet access and emergency call buttons, as well as Wi-Fi hotspots. Both cities rolled out hundreds of these units throughout the cities to create an amazing Wi-Fi system and an attractive kiosk that elevate it into the elite, smart city status. They look great! They make money through advertising and services. They are a win-win for any city.

Then there are all the cities, communities, and states that do nothing. Too many to mention. You know who you are. Yet, people continue to live in cities that have no initiative to improve. Why is that? I intend to move because, in my city, they do little, poor planning for the most part. In these areas is an opportunity for private companies to step up and try to get something rolling. Each city has different rules, so it may be too much effort and money to deploy in these cities. If that is the case, then you need to find a city that will work with you on economic development and build there. Don’t’ waste your time on areas that can’t or won’t work with you.

Not all Deployments are a Success!

In Seattle, it would have been city owned. The idea was to get gigabit rolled out across the city to improve internet connectivity anywhere. I don’t know what the agreement was between the city and Gigabit Squared, but it seems it fell apart. Maybe the company was too small or didn’t understand what the deployment would need or lacked commitment. It’s not clear to me what happened, but you can read more about it at https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/blog/techflash/2014/01/seattles-fiber-deal-with-gigabit.html?page=all. The article hints that it could be more about the private company getting financing. It also hints that neither party worked on the local buy-in.

In Utah, there was a rollout y Utopia that was failing. So, Macquarie Financial took them over. This is a financial company, not an ISP or fiber company. Macquarie offered to cover the costs of the build out. However, the plan included a utility fee of $18 to $20 per household to continue. While this doesn’t sound like a lot, it is more money out-of-pocket to continue. They had opposition called, wait for it……… Unopia! How funny is that name? UNOPIA! I must admit, I like that name, but all the same, is there an alternative? Unopia wanted to stop unnecessary fees. I get that. Why should they pay for a rollout when they don’t want the service? The lesson here is that the community didn’t want broadband bad enough, so it stalled. Learn more by looking at http://www.centervilleut.net/downloads/administration/ulct_-_utopia-macppp_faqs.april2014.pdf for this older deal.

When Incumbents fight Back!

Yes, the incumbents fight back. Not always in a way that makes sense. It would make more sense if they would just build out a network, but many go to court first. Many whine or say no one wants it. Most just criticize.

Look at Monticello, MN, and the city-owned Fibernet. The city did it to spark competition. This really ticked off the local Telco, TDS, which first took Fibernet to court, and lost! Then they decided to build their own network, which if they would have done that in the first place none of this would have happened. TDS had to get off its butt and move! Then Charter, another incumbent, slashed their prices to $60 a month for access. The moral of this example is that the city’s plan worked perfectly, they increased competition and forced the incumbents to do something, which is what they would not do before. Before Fibernet, they did nothing. Lesson learned!

Then there was Lafayette, LA, who built the network through LUS Fiber, (Lafayette Utility Service), only to be criticized by Reason.org in a statement, http://reason.org/files/municipal_broadband_lafayette.pdf, showing that they fell short of predictions and have debt. Welcome to the world of business, it takes money and patience. However, did LUS overlook the business principles when planning? Did they get a commitment from the community to purchase it? Apparently not. LUS says they are cash positive, Reason.org says they are not. To be honest, I am not sure what the real deal is here.

Let’s be honest here. Cable companies didn’t’ care about internet access, even when the customers were begging for it. They didn’t care until they had competition. They saw AT&T and Verizon offer broadband and realized that there is a market for it. Now they are becoming ISPs. I mean true ISPs are offering more and more bandwidth. Comcast rolled out Wi-Fi successfully. Now that they know there is a need and people will pay for it, they are rolling it out. That’s because they are no longer a monopoly in many areas.

Google Fiber put some fear into them. So much so that they started becoming a thorn in the side of Google. In Nashville, I talked to a friend who saw the local cable company and AT&T do all that they could to block Google from attaching the fiber to their poles. Do you blame them? NO! It’s the name of the game. While you may think this would not stop Google, it did. They began to see the realities of competition, petty fights, permitting, and pole acquisition. It costs money before you make a dime. A completely different model than what they’re used to. So, what we see now is Google Fiber on hold hoping wireless is cost-effective. They will see that site acquisition is a killer there as well. When the site acquisition costs are more than all other expenses together, you see why small cells did not roll out by the masses.

Some States Prohibit Public Networks!

What about the states, they certainly would not stop the city from building a network, would they? Oh yes, they would! As incredible as this sounds, it is a real thing. Some states, in fact, many states have laws in that stop city ownership or control broadband roll networks. Our friends at BroadbandNow has a website at https://broadbandnow.com/report/municipal-broadband-roadblocks-by-state/ that covers states with laws about broadband.

Colorado is a great example of control. The state that allows marijuana sales would not allow their cities to partner with Google Fiber to roll out broadband. It took an election to overturn the law.

It doesn’t always work out like that. In North Carolina and Tennessee, the FCC tried to have those state broadband regulations overturned, but the FCC lost. The laws remained.

The states with these laws are Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin. The laws are geared towards cities that want to own or partially own broadband networks. I think the idea is that broadband should be competitive.

This parallels what many states are doing with small cell deployments for the carriers. They have been passing state laws that allow the carriers to roll out their small cells without the local municipality slowing them down. The CTIA has done a great job lobbying the states to make life easier for the carriers at the expense of the local cities.

To be continued!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

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How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

Putting together your smart city tech solutions, planning, development, and more….TechFecta! Guiding you to a better plan through consulting!

Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

Wade4Wireless BlogCast

Smart City Broadband Initiatives Part 1

November 6, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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This is part one of a three-part series. This has been taken from my upcoming book, Smart City Use Cases, with Smart City Development Notes.

Smart City Broadband Initiatives

Are you curious about some broadband initiatives that are out there? Some broadband case studies that are have rolled out? What broadband initiatives have been successes and failures? What works better, the city owning it or a public-private partnership or private only?

I am always saying that broadband is the foundation of any smart city. Someone shared the Next Generation Network Connectivity Handbook. It’s publication by Gig.U, and it can be downloaded from http://www.gig-u.org/. Gig.U is a group that encourages the partnerships between cities and universities. They did a great job of putting together this document, published in December of 2016, showing past case studies of gigabit deployments in both wireless and wired. They cover success and failures.

Here is an outline of some of what is in this document, I highly recommend downloading it, after all, it is free!

First off, the make the point that CapEx and OpEx must be lower than the revenues coming in and it should be serving a purpose for the users. Pay attention, Value and Profit make the system sustainable! Value and profit make the system growable! It has to make money! That is something that most cities overlook because they think that the benefit will outweigh the revenue, but it will not. Revenue matters in the long run and the benefits matter up front. Up front we want buy-in and residents to love it. In the long run, we

need sustainability, so it does not bleed money in expenses.

Does it solve a problem for the

residents? So, they see the value in it? Will they pay for it? When you start a business, you need to answer these questions. Figure out the price point. Some cities can put a tax out there to pay for the system, but that is not popular in most cities.

One example that I love in this document is the cable companies. They saw broadband up to 1 Gbps as silly, but they really didn’t want to upgrade their system unless they had too. Guess what? They had to! BUT, after they got competition in first form the likes of Verizon, AT&T, and Google running fiber all over the place for a very reasonable cost to the consumer. It paid off. Now all the cable companies are touting higher speeds. They see value because they were losing market share. That’s amazing when you realize they had a monopoly for years in their neighborhoods. They had no competition, but the need for broadband and cheaper video hurt them. They thought they could control the market, but in the USE the market started swinging back with DirecTV and fiber competitors. They suddenly have to be strategic.

OK, let’s get back to the business of broadband. Once you build it, expect competition! If your business model works then more and more people will do it, just look the cable companies. While they had a monopoly for years, they got lazy. Now they have competition, and it’s hurting them. Not just from fiber, most of the younger generation realized that they have a smartphone that can do anything the cable company can do, so why pay for both? Get the picture? The landscape has changed, and if you just look at other companies that do what you do, then you only see part of the competitive landscape.

This is happening with everything because broadband is the pipe to end all pipes. It could be through fiber or wireless, but the internet has opened doors to everything unless you live in China, then it only has a few open doors and a lot of blocked websites.

There is one thing that almost any city can agree on. You need broadband in your city to compete. The question is, “How do we get it here?” This is where you can look at other examples of successes and failures.

Google Fiber was supposed to be the knight in shining armor, but they stopped. They say they are going to wait for wireless, probably CBRS, but to be honest, there are plenty of bands and products that could deliver broadband now. I think that Google realized the profit model was not what they had hoped for, but they never said that officially, they just stopped, laid off a bunch of people, changed some leadership in the company, and they started saying wireless would save the day.

More on Google fiber stopping http://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/national/article110655177.html, this is a great article because they talk about all the pain points that Google saw in the real world. TV is expensive, incumbents have more control of the poles than they ever thought possible, and maybe wireless will be easier. They also say demand is not there. I don’t get that excuse at all! It seems lame. I think they should say competition is fiercer than they thought. That is more like it. For me to sum it up, Google should have cherry-picked markets that didn’t have too much competition. They should have focused on tier 2 cities that would not only have appreciated their presence but don’t have an alternative. I live in Pennsylvania, where the cable companies rule. The rules here don’t make it an ideal state to deploy much of anything, but it has plenty of underserved cities that not only want broadband, but they need it to survive. The smaller cable companies will not make the investment until they have too. They won’t spend the money. This is an ideal target for someone like Google Fiber to deploy. But, alas, I am dreaming.

Where was I? Oh yes, economic development. Broadband is a foundation for economic development. We know that businesses need broadband to survive, but how do they get it? Many cities have a dig once policy, so if someone lays broadband, then many people need to get it in while he or she can. This really helps to get things moving and keep the competition behind you if they are late to the game. Fiber companies and deployment companies win! They can lay out the dark fiber and sell it later, not a bad model.

They also cover the 3 models that cities can look at.

Primary

This is where the city takes the lead by using public facilities to roll out the fiber and makes the investment to deploy. They use their assets to mount it. They are the provider. They may partner with someone, but generally, the city runs the business and takes the credit.

An example of this is the Chattanooga, TN, network. In 2010 the city decided to have a gigabit network available for homes. They rolled it out, and since then Volkswagen and Amazon both expanded to that area. We give the broadband credit since it was there and they took a chance to deploy. Their model served other cities like Wilson, NC, and Leverett, Ma.

They also talk about Ammon, Id, who also built the gigabit backbone. They decided to provide the gigabit backbone because the local telco would not spend any money. The city was worried because they would need 50% of the market share to make it pay for itself. Guess what? They got 70% of the market share! When incumbents get lazy, there is a great opportunity!

Huntsville, Al, owns the electric utility. This provided them with the means and foundation to deploy broadband quickly and with an experienced player. They put in the backbone and leased it to Google Fiber. This is a win-win because Google didn’t’ have to deploy the backbone, the fiber is there and ready to use. They could move ahead quickly. The city maintained control and could make money off it right away with a large customer waiting. The negative is that people perceive the fiber being built with city funds, but it worked! They had a utility, an income plan, a customer, so why not do it? They can lease the fiber to anyone, so they are not bound to only one customer, but anyone who wants it or needs it. Awesome! Learn more at https://www.gru.com/GRUComFiberOptics.aspx.

Santa Monica, Ca built out their network without a municipal department. They did it by connecting public facilities then expanding from there. They have a dig once policy, and when someone would dig, they would lay fiber. Learn more at http://ilsr.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/santa-monica-city-net-fiber-2014-2.pdf. They took the slow approach, one that would not have any upfront costs but would remain steady and efficient.

Partial

Usually a public-private partnership, PPP, that the city supports and endorses, but the private partner will be the one doing the heavy lifting and running the business. This would rely heavily on the partner, and the city would give complete support and take some of the credit, but the private business would take the profits. Partnerships matter here more than anywhere. If the partner is an ISP (Internet Service Provider) or a nonprofit, they need to be sure they can do what they say they can do. It matters big time and reputations are key.

ISPs are everywhere, not all of them look good, but many of them provide broadband to the home or local business. They often are rooted in the community if they are local and they want to succeed. However, not all of them do, I’ll point that out farther down.

If you wonder about the nonprofit, I will give you an example of one that I worked on personally. In York, Pa, there is an organization called Crispus Attucks Association that sponsored an initiative to connect the local schools up to wireless broadband. While it went well, they are a shining example of a roll out to the schools in York County. This was one of the first of its kind. While it was later replaced with fiber, it’s an example of how a nonprofit took the lead to deploy broadband. This was over 10 years ago. Gigabit was not thought to be cost-effective back then.

Westminster, Md, is an example of how the community knew they need to do something to attract people from the cities of DC and Baltimore out to their rural area. Beautiful and scenic, but far from major highways. They knew they needed broadband, and decided on fiber.They hooked up with Ting, https://ting.com/blog/next-ting-town-westminster-md/, who was a smaller ISP eager to roll out fiber. The city looked at the fiber as infrastructure, like a building or bridge, seeing it as a city asset and letting Ting manage the operations and customer service and sales. The city has an asset, but little risk and they are not running the day-to-day business, Ting is.

South Portland, Me, laid out $150,000 upfront (http://www.southportland.org/files/7514/0682/8622/06_-_ORDER_12_-_Bid_for_dark_fiber_infrastructure.pdf) to build fiber and chose GWI, https://www.gwi.net/about/ to build it. GWI will build it and run it and give 5% of the revenue back to the city.

Cleveland, Oh, decided to work with a nonprofit called OneCommunity, http://www.onecommunity.org/big-changes-onecommunity-evolves/ who is rolled out the network and is continuing to expand into other communities to increase the reach of broadband across Ohio. They are receiving support from the US Economic Development (EDA) Grant, https://www.eda.gov/grants/, continuing the work.

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Facilitator

To be continued!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

Sign-up to get all your updates!

How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

Putting together your smart city tech solutions, planning, development, and more….TechFecta! Guiding you to a better plan through consulting!

Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

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The Dallas Smart City Case Study

October 30, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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What are some smart city use cases? Well, here is Dallas. This is from my upcoming book on Smart City Use Cases.

You have been asking for smart city examples and what is in each smart city. Here is an example. This is from a new book to be released very soon called, Smart City Use Cases. We are always looking for real-world smart city examples. They are out there so why not collect many of them into a book? We all want to see what’s being done, well, here it is, one example. It is an overview but gives you an idea of what Dallas is doing.

Dallas

Of course, we all know where Dallas is, quite a city, in the heart of Texas. The larger part of the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Home to over 1.2 million people.

I have been in that area for work over 15 years ago. It is a beautiful area. One that I really enjoy working in and love visiting. I would recommend anyone going there for to stay for vacation. Don’t get me wrong, they have their share of problems, like any city. They deal with traffic, crime, growth issues, and struggle to get people to live in the city limits. Not only that, but Texas has no state income tax, which is awesome! Let’s compare, the California state income tax is

over 9% and is as complicated as the federal income tax. That means you don’t have to give a chunk your paycheck to the state government each payday. A nice perk for living in Texas, specifically Dallas.

Sorry, I digress, why do we notice Dallas as a smart city? Well, they are actively moving into that area. They partnered with AT&T to move ahead with smart city innovation. They created the Dallas Innovation Alliance. It is their job to bring innovation to Dallas.

While I am not clear on what they mean by innovation, they do point out that they want to bring smart tech to the city and improve the connections. In 2016 they release a small online publication explaining what they intend to do and how they intend to do it, It explains how they are converting streets to smart lighting using LED lights and installing sensors to track air quality and crowd noise. There it is, the special sensors that go above and beyond smart lighting. The sensors sense air quality. Sensors that detect noise. These are what makes the poles so smart.

They mention the digital kiosks, again, these are the smart keystones of the city because they are symbolic of the smart city progression.

They mention network connectivity and specify the fiber build out and the addition of cellular in the city. They also mention public Wi-Fi which is what the citizens associate with anytime connections.

Finally waste management. They have plans in place to have solar-powered trash compactors for collection throughout the city.

Smart parking to allow available spaces to be monitored and broadcast to people looking for spaces. This should ease traffic congestion if people use the apps.

All of this is going to be made possible with the apps that connect all the information to the end-user. That is the key! Using a common app to allow for all of the sensors information to make the information useful. Installing all of this stuff is one thing, to make it accessible to the people that need it is another. Who needs it?

Open parking spaces – the drivers and city planners
Live video – police, fire, city planners, and the public
Air sensors – police, fire, and city planners
Noise sensors – police, city planners
Waste management – Waste department, city planners.
Broadband access – the public, everyone else.

Do you see who needs this the most, the city planners? They should be using this data to improve the city. Each year they should evaluate the data and create a new plan for development based on what they learn. It’s not just what they see, but what’s missing as well. They need to take it all into account. Make use of the data provided to them to improve and eliminate. Then they will have a cost-effective city that is on a positive growth track.

Who is a major partner in this venture? Dallas is working with AT&T to make this happen. AT&T and the DIA have created the “Smart Cities Living Lab” to understand how the changes will improve the city. This lab lets them see how to use intelligent LED lighting. They are testing the kiosks, specifically with the CIVIQ kiosk to understand how to build the Interactive Digital WayPoint, which is a model for the CIVIQ kiosk and really cool. They have been testing sensors with Ericsson. The Living Lab is pretty cool, but eventually, it has to go live.

To see more on Dallas go to:

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

Putting together your smart city tech solutions, planning, development, and more….TechFecta! Guiding you to a better plan through consulting!

Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

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How would you Initiate a Smart City Plan?

October 16, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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How would you Initiate a Smart City Plan? What are some typical smart city approaches? I think I have a quick summary of what is out there. I added this to my upcoming book, Smart City Use Cases, which I think will cover many of the smart city rollouts that have already happened. How they approached it, and why they did it.

The thing that I see, in most cases, is that cities have a typical approach which stems from a few motivational factors.

First, what problem are you going to solve? Start with the end in mind.

Next, you need money, grant money is a big one that cities look for. You may base your problem around the grant money, and that’s OK because it will get your teams moving into problem-solving mode.

Then, future proof. This is critical to sustain your initiatives and have them seen in a positive light. You want your legacy to be a great thing, something that can be built on, not replace right away. You also want something that residents and local businesses appreciate.

Solve Problems

This means that cities need a service, so they incorporate it into smart city services. This helps with the publicity and buy in. One thing you learn about government and large companies, you need to buy in. How do you get buy-in? You make it popular, sexy, and build it up as something you can’t live without.

This is where the smart city play becomes a necessity. If the city has a garbage problem, they could just hire people to pick up the garbage, or maybe they could create a high-tech solution which may cost more now, but in the long run, it is automated and has lower maintenance costs than hiring 100 new people to do the same thing. It won’t be much more CapEx, but it will be lower OpEx over the long run, AND it will be labeled as a smart city service! We all know that smart city services are sexy, so why not own it!

Grant Money

If there is grant money, cities look at winning it, and they go after it. Not all, but if they think they have shot, it is a great way to get

started. The federal government, in the US, handed out money for contests they started in 2015. It was a great way to spark interest. Cities had several options to get the money, but it wasn’t all about the money! They got exposure, publicity, and partners. That’s right, the smart people who wanted a smart city got some smart partners. The feds did a lot to make this happen, and they knew it would spark the economy to create a new industry, the smart city industry.

Columbus, Ohio, won the department of transportation’s challenge which gave them $140M USD in grant money! Awesome for Columbus, a great place to visit and a smart city run by smart people. They get money for the autonomous vehicle research, battery research, putting in charging stations, and a healthy check to upgrade their public transportation systems. So radical that they get a $140M head start in all the other cities. Learn more at https://techcrunch.com/2016/06/23/columbus-ohio-officially-winner-of-dot-smart-city-challenge-and-140-million-in-innovation-grants/ if you’re interested.

We all know this is about the services that are coming, but if the feds would not have gotten involved, then it would not have come to the forefront. I have a list of cities below but let’s look at what companies jumped on the bandwagon.

AT&T – they started an entire smart city division with services and IOT planning, end to end.
Nokia – they have so many smart city strategies that your head will spin.
Ericsson – they moved into this because it has so many synergies with what they are already doing.
Black and Veatch – it fits right into their game plan to deploy across any city.
Crown Castle Inc. – they see the small cell and fiber opportunities here, they know it’s an opportunity.
Microsoft – actually, if you look back in history, Bill Gates saw the smart home 20 years ago, and it’s just now becoming mainstream. Microsoft sees the potential for more software and services for smart city applications. They see the huge payback.
Amazon – you read it right, Amazon. You see the cloud will be a huge part of the smart city backbone, so Amazon is on the cutting edge for cloud services. Also, they see value in the drone delivery, although who knows if they will pursue actual mass drone deployment. They also want people connected 24/7 so said people could purchase from Amazon 24/7. (I hope people buy my books 24/7!)
Apps companies because they see opportunity when people are connected. Look at how the smartphone changed the world and added many new businesses where people can use an app to make their lives better, or worse depending on your perspective.
Public safety, meaning police, fire, rescue, ambulance, and all the companies that supply them. Public safety needs You know, live video needs cameras and broadband, emergency workers need real-time connectivity wherever they are. Do you see the dots connecting? Do you get it? Broadband provided by the internet access provider, fiber by suppliers, rolled out by deployment teams, parts provided by suppliers, designed by engineers, made useful by apps and programs and wireless connectivity so that emergency workers have access where they are, not back at the dispatch center only. Do you see the dots connecting?
Any local tech business in that city will be a winner, they can participate, or they can offer new services based off of what the city is offering.

Future Proofing

The need to future proof will help smart city growth. Most cities want to retain their identity, and that is great. However, San Antonio didn’t just keep the Alamo and forget about expanding the city or growth or try to attract sports and business to their area. They know that you need to hold on and preserve history, but you also need to add high-tech services to grow the business.

Hence, future proofing will be a key element to any city. They want to do two major things, attract business and residential growth, the two should be looked at as one), AND they want to become a safe city with public safety a prime focus. All of this adds up to new services and will be the foundation for growth. Future proofing will be a key element for any city if they want to become a player in the world economy.

I would use the California cities like San Diego, Chula Vista, San Jose, Long Beach, and so much more I missed. They know that they need to be innovative and attract business. They can’t rely on the state, who has a very high-income tax, to attract people to the state, they know they must be innovative. When I look at them, I am impressed by what they have done and the approach they all have taken. They inspire me to remain motivated in this area.

I also look at Kansas City, often overlooked, but not to be outdone by anyone. They have come a long way and continue to expand. Kansas City has added interactive kiosks, broadband, and Wi-Fi so that for years to come residents and tourist alike can enjoy it and appreciate all that KC has to offer. They know that it will build off the foundation they put in.

When I visit any of the cities mentioned above, I truly appreciate all the services, connectivity, and beauty of each one. Each city makes me feel safe and connected.

Resources:

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

Putting together your smart city tech solutions, planning, development, and more….TechFecta! Guiding you to a better plan through consulting!

Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

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The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook

August 11, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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Book release alert for the Smart City Tech Planning Handbook. It is out! The Smart City Tech Planning handbook which will give you case studies, technical avenues for smart cities, and ways to deploy! Yes, it’s a guide to get you started.

The pain point is most groups working on a smart city, or a smart campus project doesn’t know where to begin. They often struggle just figuring out what is possible. I noticed that every city has a different definition of what they want for a smart city then they have no idea how to get there. They don’t know what has been done, really been done, and they don’t know how to get started.

Many cities fall prey to the large OEMs because they come in and offer a specific solution which the city may or may not want. So they go with it, or they run demos thinking that this is something that the people want. The people generally tell you what they want, if you’re listening. Don’t forget small business and large business for that matter, what do they really want to do business in your city? How do you get there? What has been done? I’m here to help!

Figure out your foundation, your assets, how to monetize and what you can use for your foundation, it could really help you now by knowing and planning, not guessing or assuming. Let’s work together!

This book is here for you to plan your path to deploying technology in your city for your purpose. Not only that but what assets do you have that you can use or even better yet, make money on. Wouldn’t it be nice if the city could find a way to create revenue streams off what they have? Remember that you don’t need to be tied to a large company to make money from your assets. In fact, do you even know what your assets are? You should figure it out ASAP! Again, this book will help you figure that out, and it will guide you to getting the help that won’t take you down a path you don’t want to do.

Showing you what has been done and what can be done. There is help for you. This is a guide to get started. It will help you see what’s been done and what’s possible. Let me help, take some time and learn all you can. Make informed decisions about how to deploy and learn from what’s been done. Understand why they did what they did. Understand how to get where you want to go.

I’ll explain more but here is how you can get it!

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook, available at:

PDF version on Gumroad: https://gum.co/saDBQ
PDF on Sellfy: https://sellfy.com/p/QAvq/
Amazon Kindle: Click here.
Paperback: Click here for the paperback!
KOBO, ITUNES, and more!

Here is an overview of the Smart City Tech Planning Handbook!

Your Smart City Planning Guide for broadband, IOT, and solutions in technology. A handbook for learning more about smart city use cases, technology, and roll out.

We want you to prepare and plan for your smart city with all the information needed to move ahead cost effectively to develop your vision. Your city may have more assets to make it smart and bring in revenue, do you know how to do that? Get some help from others who have done it. Look smart by planning for your smart city vision!

Are you working to create a smart city? Are you taking that step to add the technology need to build infrastructure for your smart city? Let me help. You can gain the knowledge to move ahead in this book to plan your deployment, your growth, your services. If you don’t’ want the book, then send me an email, I can help. This book is to help you get started.

Everyone thinks technology is just broadband, and this is a big part of today’s world, but the services need to be aligned with your smart city vision. How do you do this? Plan the vision around the technology and know what you have so you know how far you should go.

This is all covered, with case studies, plenty of links for you to reference and PDFs to download. It’s more than this book, it bigger than that, it’s providing you models and solutions.

Are you ready to build your smart city? Do you have the budget? The infrastructure? Why don’t you make sure? This book will help you and your teams!

Smart City Questions:

Do you know that the smart city is here now?

Most cities want to be a smart city, and they are looking for technology to save them. I once saw a TED talk where they described a smart city as being the way the buildings are built. Let me tell you something; the buildings are constructed in these cities. While it would be wonderful to plan a smart city from scratch, it’s not the reality of the cities out there. They intend to improve the existing city infrastructure, which is no easy task. That’s the purpose of this book, to help you work with cities and have them develop their smart city initiatives. Develop a plan!

Learn this!

What is a Smart City?

How do you plan the Smart City infrastructure?

Where do you start when developing the smart city?

What planning is involved?

Whom should I partner with?

What about permitting, rent, acquisition, construction planning?

Whom should we work with? Learn all this and more from case studies and deployment planning. The rest is up to you!

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook is broken into 3 general sections.

It provides case studies to show you what has been done in other cities around the world as well as what larger OEMs envision can be done. This is to provide you with real world case studies as well as concepts to get your idea flowing for your city. It also shows you it can be done, it’s not pie in the sky but real solutions to real problems where technology provides the solutions!
We discuss the technology that is out there and available. It is a good idea for you to learn what is real and what is coming. In today’s world, the technology and spectrum can determine what can be done and what is 10 years out. Luckily, things move fast today. The only real limitation is getting past the limitations that people, and governments, impose not themselves.
What is the foundation of smart city technology? While the technology really matters, what good is it if you can’t roll it out. These things need to happen in steps or phases. Providing a foundation is key to your smart city dream becoming a reality. Use this as a guide to building it the way that you would like to see it.

Get it today!

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook, available at:

PDF version on Gumroad: https://gum.co/saDBQ

PDF on Sellfy: https://sellfy.com/p/QAvq/

Amazon Kindle: Click here.

Paperback: Click here for the paperback!

KOBO, ITUNES, and more!

Below is a sample of the Table of Contents for you to review:

Smart City Questions
Community Living:
The Purpose of this Book
How to use this book
What’s been done?
Smart City Technology overview
The Foundation of your Smart City
Your Smart City Plan
Deploy, Deploy, Deploy!
What is a “Smart City”?
Smart City Research Case Studies
How to read this section
Smart Cities Council and Cisco
Smart Cities Projects
India Smart Cities
Singapore
Santander, Spain
Yinchuan, China
General notes
IDC Government Insights
Multiple Case Studies from National League of Cities, (NLC), “Trends in Smart City” publication.
Case Study Chicago:
Case Study Philadelphia, Pa
Charlotte, NC
San Francisco, Ca
Columbus, Oh, Smart City report
Smart City Cleveland
The US Department of Transportation Smart City Challenge
NYC Planning Document called One New York
Smart City Columbus
The Smart City Playbook by Nokia and Machina Research
Sum up Smart City Focus
Smart Cities Council
Summary
Smart City Technology
How to read this section
An Outline of Smart City Broadband
How do we use and roll out broadband?
Who uses that broadband?
What will the city get from this mass roll out?
What is the transport method?
Who will roll out what?
What technologies are available?
Sum it up
Why does Indoor Connectivity matter in a Smart City?
Fiber
Cable & Copper
Wi-Fi
LTE-U
Public safety bands
DAS systems
Small Cells
CBRS
Indoor coverage summary
Smart City IOT Technologies
What is IOT and how will we use it?
A Little History
What is NB-IOT?
Is IOT a 5G Service?
IOT Services in the Smart City
IOT Wireless Tech:
More “Smart City” IOT resources:
Fixed Wireless in the Smart City
What is Fixed Wireless?
M&A (Mergers and Acquisitions)
Spectrum for 5G Fixed Wireless
Why does Fixed Wireless Matter to a Smart City?
5G Resources
Which Technology is right for us?
What’s first?
Build or lease?
Let’s build!
It built, now what?
Leasing is easy!
Who owns the solution?
Choose your vision, then plan wisely!
Smart City Advantages of Using Technology
Summary
The Foundation of Smart City Technology
How to read this section
Assets
What do we mount on these assets?
Take Inventory of what you have
Smart City Audits
Mounting assets (lamp posts, wood poles, telephone poles)
Underground assets
Fiber assets:
Building tops and Towers
Billboards:
Parking Garages:
Street Furniture:
Wireless Backhaul:
Data Collection:
Notes:
Resources:
Summary:
Smart City Planning
Setting the Vision
How do you make the Smart City Decision?
Decisions: Expense Reduction or Income or Future Vision?
Hard Solutions
Think of your long-term budgets.
Smart City Start-Up Checklist
Don’t let the OEMs push you into something you don’t want!
Smart City Sustainability
Expense Reduction:
Rent
New Sources of Revenue
Potential Business Models
As A Service Models:
You don’t have to do it all!
Smart City “Other” Services
Resources:
How do you get Broadband to the “Underserved”?
Mounting Small Cells in the City
Deployment Solutions for Smart Cities
Smart City Obstacles, (Real and Perceived)
Deployment
Change is Certain!
A Smart City is a Safe City
Acronyms and Definitions
Naming Definitions (To help the non-technical person talk technical)
Overall Summary
Smart City Assets Are Everywhere!

Get busy! Get the book, read, learn, and plan!

Get it today!

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook, available at:

PDF version on Gumroad: https://gum.co/saDBQ

PDF on Sellfy: https://sellfy.com/p/QAvq/

Amazon Kindle: Click here.

Paperback: Click here for the paperback!

KOBO, ITUNES, and more!

Other books and products by Wade:

The 5G Deployment Handbook, https://wade4wireless.com/2017/01/30/the-5g-deployment-plan-book-release/
The Wireless Deployment Handbook for LTE small Cells, CRAN, and DAS, https://wade4wireless.com/2015/11/12/wireless-deployment-handbook-for-lte-small-cells-and-das/
Tower Climbing: An Introduction, http://wadesarver.com/tower-climbing-introduction/
The Scope of Work Tutorial, http://wadesarver.com/scope-work-training/
The Wireless Deployment Bundle, https://wade4wireless.com/2016/08/07/the-wireless-deployment-bundle/

About Wade Sarver

Hi, I’m Wade. I write blogs and books. I work as a solution manager for a major OEM. I consult groups on smart city deployments. I help market and bring products to market. I create online products to help tech deployments. Let’s make great tech happen.

It can be summed up like this. Wade Sarver is a blogger and podcaster at www.wade4wireless.com and an author of several nonfiction tech books, a solutions consultant TechFecta, www.techfecta.com, as well as a solution manager for Nokia. To reach out to Wade, you can email at wade4wireless@gmail.com or wade@techfecta.com or twitter @Wade4Wireless.

Thank you for making it to the end! I appreciate your endurance, tenacity, and perseverance!

Wade4Wireless BlogCast

How Next Century Cities Collaborate with Deb Socia

August 7, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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Building a smart city is not easy, nor is adding the infrastructure to create smart city features. It helps to work with partners who have done it before. That is why Deb Socia of Next Century Cities works hard every day to reach out and contact as many communities as possible. Collaboration is the key to getting smart city enhancements in your community. Next Century Cities has a mission to do just that, help all communities elevate through cooperation, or at least help guide them to add smart city services.

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook, available at:

PDF version on Gumroad: https://gum.co/saDBQ

PDF on Sellfy: https://sellfy.com/p/QAvq/

Amazon Kindle: Click here.

Paperback: Coming soon!

Did you have smart city questions? Did you ever wonder how the city gets the technology to improve local businesses? How does a “smart city” initiative get started? Where can cities go for help? How do they start the high-speed internet initiatives? Where can communities get help to start a tech initiative? What steps can be taken to become a smart city? What can a city do to improve health care, education, quality of life, access to broadband, and make technology affordable to the residents?

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Deb talks about they are helping communities elevate from where they are now to initiating smart city policies so that they can improve technology. While for businesses it is a business initiative. Not so easy for cities. Cities need to get this by multiple departments, raise funds, pass policies, and get buy in from departments, businesses, partners, utilities, and constituents. No easy task. That is why this non-profit group works so hard to make sure they can find mentors and partners in this venture. In the long run, smart city policies are more about improving the city. Growing the jobs and improving the quality of life. It all goes hand in hand.

The 5G Deployment Plan Book, be ready to deploy!

Deb’s group normally starts with local elected officials because they have the dream of improving their city. They are looking for help. They need someone they can trust for help. They cannot just go to the OEMs since they may be looking to sell a solution or push a solution that may not be the best option for the city. The key is to find what the city is what they need, want, and the residents want.

Tower Safety and Instruction has online training and eBooks at http://teltech-college.com/ where you can get drone, tower, safety, 5G, and deployment material on your laptop! TSI, making the best better.

To get to the next level of a smart city initiative, they may want to see how it’s been done in other cities. Here is where Next Century Cities comes in. Offering a sounding board and a group where one city can learn from another’s initiative. They could provide them a plan based on what’s been done. Maybe they could help them avoid problems. Teach them about the mistakes that other cities have made. Why not learn from what other communities have done? While policies may be different, the desired result may be the same. If they can accelerate the roll out process by initiating real and robust policies, why not?

Testing CDMA and LTE smartphones or UE devices? Get a great deal on a used and affordable ME7834L test setup here!

You need to listen to get all the information. Let’s get a high level of the questions that may help you. Deb is a wonderful resource. Next Century Cities is there to support you. It’s a two-way street, help and be helpful, remember that. T could serve as a sounding board for new ideas. It feels good when you complete a project and let others know so they can learn.

Did you ever wonder how the city gets the technology to improve local businesses?
- It takes planning.
- What do they normally want? Broadband! While it varies from city to city, goals may differ. Most, if not all want broadband rolled out throughout the city for businesses and residents. Maybe even for tourists.
How does a “smart city” initiative get started?
- It usually starts with the higher level of governments, the mayor or a CTO or economic development groups may want to improve the internet access to help local businesses grow.
- Why recreate the wheel if it’s been done? Duplicate what others have done.
Where can cities go for help?
- Next Century Cities has created a network where cities can turn to each other to learn from someone who has done it before. They have provided a platform to share ideas.
How do they start the high-speed internet initiatives?
- They could start with business partnerships. Learning what has worked in other areas and what vendors have solutions. They could leverage their utility partners to help.
- Building infrastructure to support city-wide broadband need planning and support.
Where can communities go to for help in starting a tech initiative?
- It could be the OEMs, consultants, or fellow cities that have already done it.
- Whom do you trust the most? If another city has done it, then you have a model.
- Next Century Cities is a great place to start.
What steps can be taken to become a smart city?
- Not an easy question, first, define what smart city means to you and your community, then develop a plan for policies and technical requirements. The foundation is the key, then build on it.
What can a city do to improve health care, education, quality of life, access to broadband, and make technology affordable to the residents?
- Roll out broadband, build the infrastructure, create policies that enable this to happen quickly and efficiently.
Who can join Next Century Cities?
- Communities, cities, counties, any government organization looking to help or get help in creating s smart city initiative.
- Vendors can contact and support Next Century Cities, maybe become partners, but not become a member.
Where can I learn more about smart cities?
- Next Century Cities has a great resource page, http://nextcenturycities.org/resources/ where you can see articles in the main list, but at the bottom left they have the resources broken down to help you understand specific areas, like pole attachments and small cells.
What are Next Century Cities principles? Found at http://nextcenturycities.org/wp-content/uploads/Next-Century-Cities-Two-Pager.pdf.
- High-Speed Internet Is Necessary Infrastructure
- The Internet Is Nonpartisan
- Communities Must Enjoy Self-Determination
- High-Speed Internet Is a Community-Wide Endeavor
- Meaningful Competition Drives Progress
- Collaboration Benefits All
How do I join Next Century Cities?
- Look at their membership map at http://nextcenturycities.org/members/ and then go to http://nextcenturycities.org/contact/ and sign up.
How can I support Next Century Cities?
- Go to https://www.crowdrise.com/helpsupportnextcenturycities and give what you can.

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Deb Socia is the Executive Director of Next Century Cities, an innovative organization that helps cities develop city initiatives and policies for the infrastructure. They do this by connecting communities so that someone starting out can learn from the more experienced cities. Going beyond technical initiatives and into the city policies and planning. When communities want to move ahead, it helps to talk to someone who has done it before. Contact Den through the contact page or at Deb@nextcenturycities.org.

Next Century Cities is a nonprofit organization for communities to become connected and learn from each other and teach each other how to get to the next level or do something specific. To find out more go to http://nextcenturycities.org/about/overview/ or download the information sheet at http://nextcenturycities.org/wp-content/uploads/Next-Century-Cities-Two-Pager.pdf to get a good overview of what they offer. Contact Next Century Cities at http://nextcenturycities.org/contact/ to join or learn more.

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Wade4Wireless BlogCast

Indoor Connectivity for the Smart City

July 3, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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I know what you’re thinking, indoor connectivity, why does that matter for the smart city? What is indoor connectivity for the smart city? Is it part of a smart building? I mean really Wade, who cares? Indoor connectivity will matter just as much as outdoor connectivity. After all, the smartphone should not stop working when you go into a building. If your phone stops working, how does that make you feel? It sucks, right! What about public safety, they can’t have their radios die the minute they go into a building, that could mean death, literally, for them or whoever needs help. Indoor connectivity should be thought of as crucial for any city, much less a smart city.

Do you stop using your device when you go inside any building? Seriously? Of course not, you don’t expect it too.

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Indoor coverage included the entire building. It’s sad when you see a disaster happen and people don’t have coverage in the obvious places in a disaster, like the stairwells or the closets or basements. Why is that? Because normally people don’t go there and the building owner didn’t want to pay for something that no one would normally use. That is why there are regulations, in some cities, to make sure that at least the emergency bands used by fire and police are working in those areas. The local fire departments and radio shops can put this in and test it. However, most business people don’t enforce this because they know that businesses and building owners do not want to pay for it. We all think it’s OK until a fire or a terrorist attack happens and the people inside can’t communicate because they are in dead zones. In an emergency, a dead zone could mean that the people could die because they could not reach help. That often gets overlooked just to save a few dollars in many cities.

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So, when planning a smart city, the regulations matter, the rules to define whether a company needs to have the best coverage, wired and wireless, in their building really matters in the grand scheme. Why not think it through and look at what has happened in the past. Take the necessary measures to ensure that buildings are being built to the proper code for structure and safety.

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Fiber

We still need fiber inside the building. Run it to every floor if possible. We really need fiber not only from the outside in but from the demarcation to each floor and across every floor. We need to connect every data and computer room. Even the emergency systems, the alarms systems will need to be connected. They will also need redundancy, just in case some contract goes crazy with a drill or a reciprocating saw, I have seen this first hand with wires, pipes, and power. It happens!

Fiber matters for what we want to do, the way we want to go. Broadband is what we all need to some point. Whether it’s back to an internet connection or if its dedicated fiber to a specific location for a specific purpose, we want fiber. After all, it connects the world. We all thought that satellites would do that, and they do, but they have too much delay. Fiber needs to be laid, but it works so well and opens new options.

Cable & Copper

Cable companies will be running their solutions to these building. They may even use fiber to get in the building, but they may rely on cable and CAT5 to distribute throughout the building once they are in.

CAT5 and CAT6 will be crucial. Ask any data center, any enterprise, any company that thinks they can run without having data lines all over the offices. Sure, they rely on Wi-Fi and small cells, but what feeds the Wi-Fi and small cells? That’s right, either fiber but most likely CAT5. It’s been around for a long time, and it’s not going anywhere.

I know most of you think that fiber will take over, but until fiber can carry power, (spoiler alert – it can’t alone!), then we need CAT5 or CAT6 or whatever else they come out with. CAT5 has been used for over 15 years, and it’s still going strong. Don’t deny it, we love wireless, but we need CAT5 somewhere.

Wi-Fi

This is the obvious thing that we all expect to see everywhere. I don’t think I need to cover this issue because almost every public area has Wi-Fi and most offices have it as well.

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LTE-U

This is going to be on the same spectrum as Wi-Fi and the carriers are excited because the handoff from licensed LTE spectrum to unlicensed LTE is almost seamless if it’s setup properly. This will be a game changer for all the carriers to share loading with devices in the ISM license-free band. WOW! A way for your smartphone to hand off its data and VoLTE, (Voice over LTE) calls to a spectrum that should not cost you any data on your plan.

If this can be put on every device, I would see it really is a game changer for the carriers to hand off to almost any vendors units. With the coming of age of the cloud and mobile edge computing, MEC, we will see things improve greatly.

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Public safety bands

This is critical, but it’s an unknown. I don’t talk about public safety bands much because it’s going to go through changes. These departments still need to have the urgent PTT, (Push to Talk), Voice access because it’s reliable and immediate. We don’t want to wait for the emergency responders to be able to communicate in an emergency.

They still need data to work their laptops and gather information. FirstNet is taking care of this with their recent partnership with AT&T to provide dedicated coverage for first responders. I am waiting to see how this plays out. I am glad that first responders will have a priority channel, but most of them already have smartphones. They don’t all have devices paid for by their jobs, many use their personal devices and coverage plans because not all governments have the budget to supply everyone with what they need.

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For the emergency responders, there are rules in many areas that require buildings to put in DAS systems or radios so that emergency responders have coverage as I said before. I have no idea who has this requirement and who doesn’t. It really seems to vary, even within cities.

While the public safety aspect will weigh heavily in the smart city planning, it should be thought of as part of the wireless and wireline deployment. Please don’t make it an afterthought. It will take regulations to ensure that all indoor coverage is thought out and planned properly.

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DAS systems

DAS systems are still booming in high density and high traffic areas. They are being upgraded. While small cells are making a dent, they are being used together to provide better coverage for less cost.

You see, the original DAS systems could include a Macro site to feed it for the system to reach all the areas of the building, stadium, or whatever you’re trying to cover. Now they can feed it with small cells. Now they can transport the signals digitally, meaning that instead of coax cable they can run fiber and use power from a local connection point or even run things through router and power the radio head with PoE, (Power Over Ethernet) which is really a great way to deploy.

DAS, (Distributed Antenna System), is a great way to get the signal out to the people, but it’s a financial commitment that small and some mid-size businesses don’t want to pay for. The carriers no longer see a payback on these systems, and they are looking for a less expensive way to get the signal out to the people.

Hey, I love DAS systems. They are crucial for the wireless infrastructure to cover venues. But the carriers are looking for more cost-effective ways to get the signal out. Now that we entered the age of a seamless digital network using LTE for wireless we can distribute the signal using fiber and CAT5 cable instead of the coaxial cable and splitters and analog amplifiers that we relied on in the past. DAS systems have evolved and will continue to evolve to meet the needs of today’s market.

CBRS

I have been speaking about how the spectrum of 5G will shift into the hands of the small business once again. The US CBRS is the 3.5GHz band, which runs from 3550 to 3700 MHz band. CBRS stands for Citizens Broadband Radio Service (I remember the CB, Citizens Band, here in the US). It is a lightly licensed spectrum, but it is split up into 2 areas. There is Military radar, and Earth stations that use this spectrum that is grandfathered in and have priority access. That will not change. There will be Authorized Shared Access, (ASA). Currently in the US only, but Europe is looking to follow suit with Licensed Shared Access, (LSA).

ASA includes:

Incumbent access including the federal government and satellite providers.
Priority access licenses (PAL) which are 7 10MHz licenses to be awarded to the highest bidders. PALs will be protected from the GAA users. PAL will include commercial users like carriers, rural operators, are a 3-year license with only 1 renewal term allowed now, and will be in the 3500 to 3650 portion of the spectrum. One licensee can hold only 4 PAL licenses.
General access user, (GAA) which is “Licensed by rule” which requires the rules to be followed. This will be dedicated in the 3650 to 3750 MHz portion of the band.
A PAL may gain additional GAA spectrum.
Companies that currently have this spectrum licenses will be able to keep their licenses; this was used for WiMAX in the past, now it will be LTE focused.
Licensing will be done by the Spectrum Allocation System, (SAS), which is a group that can charge for these services, currently being led by Google and Federated Wireless.
Hardware vendors include SpiderCloud, Ruckus, Nokia, Ericsson, Samsung, ip.access, and Acceleron.

I was reading a report by ABI Research that mentions several articles pointing to Verizon Wireless plans to use CBRS to replace middle price DAS systems, the articles in RCR and Fierce Wireless using CBRS as the neutral host solution. Then it shows how Nokia added the CBRS to its Airscale product and the Ruckus OpenG product to follow suit. Not to be outdone but Acceleron also has a CBRS product. Just to be fair, Spidercloud was one of the first to have a CBRS product. It spears that Spidercloud is already reaching out the DAS vendors and Verizon to bridge the gap for smaller DAS systems. We shall see more of SAS, (Small Cell Antenna Systems) popping up to replace the smaller DAS systems.

Could CBRS solve the DAS middleware problem? Could CBRS products fill the void where no one wants to invest in those 100,000 to 500,000 square feet venues where it is too small for a carrier but too large for a small cell? Is this the savior we are looking for? I hope so! A clean way to hand off and a lightly licensed spectrum where we would not all be trampling on each other in the Wi-Fi space. I see a solution that could solve so many issues, financial and technical.

This will mostly be an indoor solution, something where we could replace some DAS system with a common platform licensed spectrum that all the carriers and non-carriers could share to reach the dense population, it will be used for enterprise and outdoor coverage as a critical part of the 5G network slice. I am looking forward to seeing what small businesses can do with this spectrum to serve the people.

If you want a quick overview, here are 2 links that can help:

I see CBRS filling the public venues with an alternative to smaller DAS systems by dropping in a CBRS small cell with multiple bands to provide a lightly licensed signal where the carriers would roam onto this device. Clean signal without the threat of another access point going up on the same band(s).

Factories have connected systems that may not be so reliant on Wi-Fi. Now they can dedicate a specific carrier to that function inside the factory so that no one may share it. Keep that spectrum dedicated for the machines and very low latency so that no one else can use it, jump on it, or break it. That is a game changer for indoor wireless!

I often overlook the use of indoor wireless for factories and distribution warehouses. This is a great use case for indoor wireless and one that needs low latency as well as dedicated spectrum. You want to keep it secure and dedicated for one purpose. Here is a perfect spectrum that they can add to any machine in their system. It helps to cut down on issues due to latency. Distribution will need to provide accurate order filling, and factories will need to have real-time feedback on how the machines are performing or if they need to make changes.

CBRS will allow small business and Enterprise to have their lightly licensed spectrum, something that the FCC has kept from small business for quite some time. I get it, they make billions on the auctions, but it has not helped small business broadband. They feel the ISM band was enough for them to build on. I feel differently. Now I see opportunity in CBRS, centimeter wave and millimeter wave spectrums. Let’s deploy and bring broadband and narrowband to the masses! Broadband for internet access and narrowband for IOT access. It’s exciting to see the industry have more opportunity again!

How secure could you make a CBRS system? You could have a dedicated band just for your internal use and only have it on your devices. Invisible to the outside world but giving you the bandwidth that you need in your office, warehouse, or factory.

We have seen the players be OEMs and carriers and other integrators in this space. Who has been conspicuously absent has been the cable companies. Here is space where they can shine, grow, and spread beyond Wi-Fi without building an ironclad agreement with one carrier. They have the money and the deployment process to make this a phenomenal area of growth. I would like to think that SpiderCloud would be calling the cable companies with proposals and business cases. Just my opinion. It is time for the cable companies to make it happen in wireless deployment.

Inside coverage summary

So, to sum it up, there are plenty of options that you will have. Some you have control of and some you don’t. You also need to separate what the first responders will need and what other services will need. This is specific to the band and the coverage. It matters.

When planning, try not to think of just one service or area. Look at the building, then look at the service you want. Something like what I have below.

The building has:
1. Common areas like the entrance, the mezzanine, the food courts.
2. Emergency exits, stairwells, basements, rooftops and other areas that are only accessed by workers, contractors, and when there’s an emergency.
3. Office space that may be secure and locked occupied by tenants.
4. Rest rooms, public and tenant only.
5. Hallways where people could be walking at any given time.
6. Entrance and exit areas where people could stop to smoke on break or congregate.
Coverage for:
1. Public safety should cover the entire building.
2. Carriers will want to cover the common areas and some tenant offices.
3. IOT coverage for the meters, air conditioners, thermostats and other controls.
4. Private networks throughout the building in tenant spaces.
Emergency phone connections:
1. Elevators
2. Rooftops
3. One on each floor
4. Basement
5. Wherever the generators are located.

I hope this helps you what needs to be added to the buildings in a smart city.

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

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How do you get Broadband to the “Underserved”?

June 5, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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Broadband is needed everywhere, so much so that even the federal government sees broadband as a utility that is needed by all people. How do you get broadband to the underserved areas?

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In the suburban and country, (remote areas), it is simply a matter of budgets. However, CenturyLink is a company I see serving those areas. They are doing the best they can get wired broadband to that area along with the wireless carriers. I really see Verizon out in some remote areas, deploying LTE too far out areas. This is amazing. Areas that once were thought to be so remote that they can now have your smartphone or laptop connected via LTE signals. WOW!

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What about city coverage? They don’t always have the coverage that we think they do, especially in areas where the “payback” is not obvious. This is a recurring theme I hear from cities. The need to make sure that broadband is available in all areas of the city. This seems like a non-negotiable issue. I guess it’s true that broadband is the new utility. As a utility, it assumes that we need it to live or at least live at a quality level of life. Of course, we can all live without electricity or running water, but do we want to? Of course not, not in our daily lives anyway. We want to have broadband as part of our daily lives.

Broadband is more than a luxury or something that’s nice to have. It is the livelihood of so many people, including me, to work efficiently and improve their daily lives. That is what the cities see. They see hundreds of small business taking off, becoming more than just a hobby or a way to play games or even watch TV. Broadband is all of that and more.

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I work and train from home using the internet to do it. I started my side business at home because I have broadband and because work no longer pays for it. I feel no guilt using it for gain and learning new skills, something that if work paid for they might frown upon it. It ain’t free! I pay for it. Work no longer pays for any broadband to the house yet they expect you to have it and work using it. Did you catch that, they expect you to have it. Broadband to the home has become an expectation, not a luxury.

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The connection is not free, however. I pay for that, and it is part of my monthly service. I love it and yet I do pay for it and not it’s more important to me than TV on my cable bill. That is a shift in today’s world where cable and the internet would be on the same bill. However, today it’s an expectation.

Back to the smart city saga, they see the need because they want their residents to learn at home, to have the opportunity to work from home, and the bigger opportunity to start their online businesses at home or at least in a nearby office. They see the value is providing value to their residents. They see the success of each person that learns to take advantage of this. They know that broadband is a game changer.

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Now, how do we get the signal to the people? There is always fiber, which is awesome for getting broadband. However, it ain’t cheap, and most companies don’t want to add it to the “underserved” areas of town. You see, the big boys want to see a payback in a timely manner and it may not happen there. The cities are frustrated with this because those are the areas that could benefit the most. It’s a social dilemma because these areas need the opportunities to grow business, but the companies that can make it available to them won’t do it because they don’t see the immediate payback.

Business is business so what many cities are doing is taking the initiative to put broadband in these areas. Since they have fiber in some sections of this part of town, they are starting to rely on Wi-Fi to get the signal to the people. It’s what we used to call Muni Wi-Fi, municipal Wi-Fi where Wi-Fi covers the city, area by area. This way the people can connect for a reasonable price and almost anywhere they are near the hotspot.

For some examples of Muni Wi-Fi, take a look at the FierceWireless article here, http://www.fiercewireless.com/tech/muni-wi-fi-2-0-time-cities-are-getting-smarter about how Wi-Fi is getting better.

To be honest, many of these initiatives have not been overwhelmingly successful. Not always a failure either. Somewhere in between, I would say. However, for the area where they don’t have anything else, it is a game changer for the residents, if they are ready for it. In today’s world, we have every device with Wi-Fi in it, smartphones and laptops and Kindles and iPads. While these are all high-end devices, I really don’t know more than 10 people that don’t have a smartphone. The ones that don’t have smartphones really could care less about the internet, so let’s not talk about them.

Let’s speak of the thousands of people that not only have it but rely on Wi-Fi to offload their smartphone data. Many times Wi-Fi works better than the carrier’s system unless you have a great LTE connection. While new formats are coming out in 2018, Wi-fi is already here and in almost every device. It can really help these areas if you educate the people.

Educate people? What does that mean? It means tell them it’s there! To do this, you need to get the word to them so that they know it’s there. Wi-Fi hotspots are very limited so most people may not see it. They might not know where to go to get connectivity. It is the city’s job to educate them, let them know it’s available, and what they should pay for it or how long it is free. Most people love free, including me. Let them know it’s there by other means!

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Just because it’s there doesn’t mean people will come, it’s not the “Field of Dreams” just yet, do your part. Make sure that the word gets out, and the people know what the terms are. It’s like when you go to the airport, and the Wi-Fi is only free for an hour. You usually read it on a billboard or see it on a screen or kiosk before you read the acceptance terms on your smartphone or laptop. Well, you may read it on your laptop, but probably not your smartphone.

Then you have some dedicated fans who are so grateful that you provided Wi-Fi for them. Getting the word out has been a major problem in the past. However, in the present, the cable companies have done a great job in letting you know where they have Wi-fi available and how long you can use it for free.

How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

To get Wi-Fi out there it is not easy. There are 3 major things you need, 1) backhaul, 2) mounting assets with power, and 3) Equipment. All the rest will come together, but most people think you can mount anywhere. Without power and backhaul and a place to mount, your equipment is useless. It takes time and money to plan this out. I often see how people think it’s like putting a hotspot in your home, but it is not. While you’re not building towers, you still need an installation crew to mount it somewhere and have a backhaul plan in place. Remember that this is a professional installation, not something you plug-in, drop, and run.

If you’re in the rural areas, then you know that Wi-Fi is not a viable solution. There is just too much area to cover. We need to rely on fiber, cable, copper, and licensed wireless to cover these broad areas. They need to have it available where the people are. It’s going to continue to be a problem. While VSAT, satellite, is a viable option, it hasn’t panned out so well. It just never really served the way we all hoped, the delays were high, and when the transponder gets loaded, everybody gets slow. Slow sucks! We all have the need for speed, not the patience for connection issues. This will be an issue.

The smart city has many options. They need to consider each one and figure out who will pay for it.

That is a high overview on one thing that I see in all cities, the need for broadband speed. It’s not going anywhere anytime soon. People rely on broadband for more and more in their everyday lives. So getting it to them in some way is critical!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

See Ya!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

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Wade4Wireless BlogCast

Smart City Planning Audits

May 22, 2017 Wade Leave a comment

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If you think you have a plan for a smart city, great. If you don’t them decide what to do, just don’t waste this time by not knowing what you have.

One thing I have seen with Wi-Fi rollouts and Fiber rollouts is that in most cases the city is guessing at who owns what. I get it; there are a lot of poles, holes, and cables run throughout the city. I don’t believe that on a person can really get a handle on who owns what.

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What you can do is audit what you have. Learn who owns what and who can attach to it. This is something that will take time and spread across departments, utilities, and services. These are going to vary and will be something that the city can leverage to make income, rollout services, or make changes to save money. The audit is going to be key. If you don’t think that your internal teams can do it, then hire a group to do it.

How do you do any of this if you don’t know what you already have?

Tower Safety and Instruction has online training and eBooks at http://teltech-college.com/ where you can get drone, tower, safety, 5G, and deployment material on your laptop! TSI, making the best better.

Mounting assets (lampposts, wood poles, telephone poles):

The assets I am talking about could be one of many things. The obvious would be the poles, rooftops, tower, and anything that you can mount a radio or fiber. Think about all the poles and map posts and guy wire that a radio can be mounted to!

We now live in the age of constant and never-ending connectivity. Think about what we can do if we get the wireless signals out to the people! It will be a necessity at some point. The owners of the poles and lampposts in the city can really benefit. I don’t think I am telling you anything new. This is already something that is being hunted down by most carriers in all cities. They want to mount radios to get the signal as close to the people as possible.

You, as a city, should know who owns what. If it’s you, then great, if it’s a utility, great! Just make sure you have it documented somewhere online so when someone tries to gain access they know whom to talk to and how to fill out the permits. The zoning information would be helpful too. Make it easy for them.

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Don’t’ forget what your requirements are with noise and aesthetics. These are things that a company like Crown Castle or Verizon will need to know when they deploy. If they put something up that you don’t like or is noisy, then the residents complain. Usually not to them, but to the city. They talk of problems and the eyesore and of course, the noisy fans. It matters to them because they live 20 feet from it. They pay their city taxes, and they want to have a beautiful and quiet neighborhood. That’s why it really helps if you do your part and define in great detail what you expect prior to issuing any permits.

This is the one thing that I learned from muni Wi-Fi, the poles are poorly managed in many cities. They don’t’ worry about it or care about it. They let it up to the contractors, us, to figure it out. Now they may regret not keeping up with it because it takes a lot of time and walking and research to figure it all out. I wouldn’t give it away for free. I would sell it, or I would keep it which means that it’s of no use the next time because things may have changed. See the problem; old data could be bad data. Maybe a great place to start, but maybe starting over would be easier.

How do you plan goals? Now you can plan 5 Weeks at a time! The 5-week Planning Journal, (click here), available now in paperback from Amazon!

What about mounting fiber to the poles? Often, we think it’s underground, but it could be overhead. The issue may be who owns the pole. If someone else signed an agreement that can refuse a competitor mounting to the pole, then you have limited assets. If you don’t’ think this happens, then look at http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/local/2016/10/25/comcast-sues-metro-over-google-fiber-backed-pole-otmr-ordinance/92748490/ where Comcast did all that they could to block Google Fiber. It became a court battle, https://consumerist.com/2016/09/20/comcast-att-try-again-to-stall-google-fiber-in-nashville-by-writing-law-to-slow-it-down/ where they could not get along, not at all.

So, what’s a city to do? Look at the agreements you signed with your cable and fiber businesses. Look at how the utilities structured the contracts if they did so at all. Most utilities didn’t care until recently. Those contracts traditionally have been a headache for them. I get it, they are a pain to manage, and that’s not their primary income. However, they need to play nice in this new world of 5G!

Underground assets:

OK, this is technically a mounting asset, but why not separate it out. Now the Wi-Fi companies are getting creative in getting the signal to the people. They are working to provide coverage even if it’s on a manhole cover. Who owns the manhole? You should have that documented somewhere.

What about putting in vaults to mount the radios and router equipment so that it can connect to the fiber? Yes, underground vaults are a brilliant idea that is coming of age so that all we need to put on the pole is the antenna and maybe a very small radio head. Who will own that asset? I say the city, and they have a beautiful underground radio vault where they can charge rent.

What about the routing of cable? Here is another place the city or utility can allow access to the fiber and cable runs. This is something that they can lease. If you just want to stop the roads from getting ripped up every 2 years, plan ahead with empty conduits so that future runs can be fed from manhole to manhole. Make it easy and clean to allow a new player to come in and run cables by getting access to conduits that the city and utility planners put in ahead of time to save the streets from getting ripped up. Plan ahead, my friends!

Fiber assets:

You may have unused fiber you don’t think you need that you could lease or sell to someone in need. It’s extra income. If you don’t need it or don’t see an immediate need, sell or rent it.

You may be able to share some strands that you have with another carrier, business, or a customer. I know you may not want to get into the fiber business, but you could have a company manage this for you so that all you see is the recurring income.

These are assets that you may already have that you don’t know about. Make the most of it and get some income if possible.

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Building tops and Towers:

You probably know what towers ad building tops you have, I can only imagine. However, can you lease space off of them? In the past, you tried to keep it secure, but in this communication centric world, you can start opening up this revenue stream.

Many times you have more value than you originally thought. The rooftops that are empty because at one time they were too low now are closer to the public and possibly the best height for small cells to be mounted on edge. Open up your perspectives and see what you have to offer.

Your tower may be loaded on the top, but what about the lower parts? Are they open? Are they near busy places in the city? Take advantage of them and open them up!

Billboards:

This is something that the city may not own, but they could have access to. Many billboards have power which means they could be prime real estate for small cells and Wi-Fi and IOT! Use them. Find out who owns the property and who manages them. Keep track of them and see if you can offer them to wireless providers coming into your city.

If you think they don’t matter then think of your public safety systems. As FirstNet rolls out, they are going to push to mount in cities at some point. Make this another place they can use. AT&T will need more space, they want to cover your city, and you can bet they will use the FirstNet name to mount anywhere they can. Why not?

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The Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS showing you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute.

Parking Garages:

I often see city-owned parking garages in smaller cities. This is a great place to put antennas on. The stairwells are a great place to mount Wi-Fi and small cells. Lower levels could be used for small cells. This is another thing you should look at in your audit to see what you have to create a new source of income. Get the word out so that you expand your portfolio in a good way.

How will you know if you don’t make it available to all?

Street Furniture:

You have bus stops; train stops, parks, benches, garbage cans, and dumpsters, maybe even kiosks that would be a great fit for small cells, Wi-Fi, interactive displays, and more. Why not use them? You have the property already in place, and if you have power to them, you’re all set. The carriers may want to run fiber, but ask if they could use wireless backhaul or an alternative to fiber. See if fiber is nearby, it may not be so bad to run it there after all.

This may be a great opportunity to update your bus stops and train stops, make the most out of this. If you already had the plan to upgrade, think of what other services you could add. If they are owned by the transit company and not the city, then partner with them to improve what they have. Use LED lighting to save costs, add Wi-Fi to add value. So much more can be done. We can add small cells to get the carriers in there to improve their coverage and collect some rent along with it. As IOT coverage expands, it adds another source of income and service for the city and the transit company. It pays to have partners.

You could have large garbage cans or recycling cans or donation centers that people go to that are big and fixed. Take advantage of those structures to add small cells, Wi-Fi, or even a kiosk to share with the city. This is a form of street furniture that has value to a wireless rollout.

Wireless Backhaul:

If you have microwave or data backhaul, it could be used and leased to others. Many times old microwave shots will be taken down or not used, so why not put in something that could serve your city or the businesses nearby. It’s worth looking into. It could be Wi-Fi or a point to point link or a multipoint link. If you connect those links to the internet, you could connect buildings to a backbone. That’s something that you could offer to small businesses in that building, a broadband connection.

Data Collection:

I know this is a strange thing to audit, but it’s a valuable asset that is often overlooked. Think of how this could be useful. You may not see value in the data that your team has collected, but it has great value. Local business and non-profits need this data! Residents need this data! You use it internally so often that you take it for granted, but it has value.

If you give it away or if you use it internally, it can really help more than your teams. If you share it, either sell it or give it away or a combination, then your city can grow exponentially. This is something that small businesses, partners, and residents will find useful when deciding what to do next.

Small businesses may want to expand to a new neighborhood, or they may want to start a new business. The data that you provide will help them expand with great knowledge. It helps them make an educated guess using what they know, their customer feedback, and your data.

Partners and non-profits could be trying to help the city do something new, innovative, or charity work. Why not help them streamline what needs to be done and where to start. This is all going to be taken from what they learned and the data you provide. They want to help you become better, a better city with a better reputation. Do it as a team, play the part of supporter.

Residents are looking for what to do and what neighborhood to live in. The data you provide can help them make that decision. They need your input so that they can improve their daily lives. So that they can brag to their friend and family about what a great city they live in. Help make them proud of your city!

Notes:

I just want your teams to think outside the box and see value in more than the physical assets. I often fall into this being a wireless guy. I see so many things that are useful but not taken advantage of. Why not use all of them.

Resources:

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion?

City Strategies for a Broadband Initiative

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Who buys broadband, really?

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Pricing matters!

What about Wi-Fi?

Not all Deployments are a Success!

When Incumbents fight Back!

Some States Prohibit Public Networks!

To be continued!

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Smart City Broadband Initiatives

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To be continued!

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Solve Problems

Grant Money

Future Proofing

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Here is an overview of the Smart City Tech Planning Handbook!

Smart City Questions:

The Smart City Tech Planning Handbook is broken into 3 general sections.

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Table of Contents

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Other books and products by Wade:

About Wade Sarver

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Fiber

Cable & Copper

Wi-Fi

LTE-U

Public safety bands

DAS systems

CBRS

Inside coverage summary

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Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

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Hubble Foundation helps the families of climbers in a time of need and beyond with financial support and counseling!

Tower Family Foundation supports the families of tower climbers at the time of crisis when a climber falls with financial assistance and more.

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Mounting assets (lampposts, wood poles, telephone poles):

Underground assets:

Fiber assets:

Building tops and Towers:

Billboards:

Parking Garages:

Street Furniture:

Wireless Backhaul:

Data Collection:

Notes:

Resources:

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!