Majors cities tuning in to wireless networks

Municipal Wi-Fi would allow you to read e-mail from a park bench or download a tune in your car

Roberto Rocha
Sun

MONTREAL - After years of development and debate, wireless networks in major cities are here to stay.

Like the 911 emergency phone service a generation ago, the new it-thing for cities is wireless Internet access that blankets large parts of town.

Picture denizens blithely reading e-mail, downloading music and doing online banking from park benches or the passenger seat of a car, snatching their Internet connections from radio waves in the air.

Though municipal Wi-Fi (short for Wireless Fidelity) has existed for some years in small scales, its popularity is now higher than ever. The number of U.S. cities and counties with wide-scale networks is 193 and rising, according to the Wi-Fi news site muniwireless.com.

Today, cities are dreaming big -- some, like San Francisco, want free access for all within city limits.

The rush to go wireless is part populism, part cost-cutting, depending on the model. While some cities ballyhoo Wi-Fi blankets as the miracle cure to the digital divide -- the lack of access to information technology in the lower classes -- others simply want to make city government more efficient.

Both models are right, says Ellen Daley -- an analyst with Forrester Research, a technology research firm -- but few have struck the right balance.

"City-wide Wi-Fi networks aren't well-proven yet," she said. "We're seeing some hype now, but next year we'll see the reality. It may not be a good idea for all cities after all."

Municipal Wi-Fi makes sense if a city wants to reduce its communication costs. Workers can talk on voice-over Internet phones and save on cellular bills. Police can file their reports remotely rather than having to return to their stations all the time.

© The Vancouver Sun 2006