After several years of planning, the city of Loveland broke ground Wednesday on a construction project to create Pulse, a city-owned broadband system.

Early in the morning, construction workers and city employees gathered in the cold air to watch the first of five telecommunication equipment huts that will be installed around the city be put into place outside the Loveland Water and Power building. A crane lowered the 60,000-pound hut onto a concrete platform, and then prepared a vault next to the hut that will hold fiber and electric equipment.

The city has contracted with Alpha Technologies to manage and install the huts, which will hold battery banks, electrical wiring and racks and cabling for equipment. The other four huts should be installed by the end of the year.

A fiber network will connect the huts, and the huts will distribute service to homes and businesses in Loveland.

Almost exactly a year ago on Nov. 4, 2018, Loveland City Council voted 7-2 in favor of establishing a city-owned retail broadband utility with regional collaboration.

The project is expected to take three to five years to complete, and will cover the entire city. It will be funded by $95 million in bonds that were approved earlier this year.

The city had to cut ties with its expected construction contractor over the summer because negotiations stalled, said Kim Reeves, construction project manager for Pulse. Pulse will be bringing its new recommendation to the City Council for approval next week.

The Wednesday installation was handled by GE Construction, and the crane was from Entrac Inc.

It was a long road to the first day of construction. The idea of creating a municipal broadband network originated six years ago, and the city started working on a feasibility study in 2016, said, Brieana-Reed Harmel, the city’s fiber manager.

Reed-Harmel oversees all of the operations of the Pulse team, and said that seeing construction take place after all their years of planning was incredibly exciting.

“This is the fruition of all our hard work,” she said.