Google Fiber Huntsville

Optic fiber cable

(zentilia)

Map of the planned fiber districts in Huntsville. As of Sept. 13, 2016, crews had begun construction in the Chase fiber district (purple) in northwest Huntsville.

Northwest Huntsville could be the first part of the city offered Google Fiber high speed Internet services as early as summer 2017, Huntsville Utilities said today.

Spokesman Joe Gehdres said crews began laying fiber optic cable this week in a subdivision at the corner of Winchester Road and Pulaski Pike. Next will come other neighborhoods in that area.

"That's where the cable is going in," Gehdres said. "Presumably, as the network is completed, that's where the providers will offer their systems first. Presumably. That's not a Huntsville Utilities decision."

Northwest Huntsville is getting cable first because of a utilities' decision to place its first "fiber hut" - a hub for multiple fiber connections - at its Chase area power distribution center in northeast Huntsville.

"It was an easy spot for us to place the hut," Gehdres said. "We have a large facility out there with plenty of space."

Bear Communications of Lawrence, Kansas, submitted a low bid to install the neighborhood-level cable, Gehdres said. It has one crew working in northwest Huntsville this week but will ramp up to as many as a dozen crews over the next year.

For purposes of expanding the fiber network, Huntsville has been divided into six districts. They are, roughly, northwest Huntsville, Five Points/Blossomwood area, Hampton Cove area, west Huntsville, southwest Huntsville and south Huntsville.

"I can't tell you what district they will go to next," Gehdres said. He did say that crews will be in multiple districts at the same time as their numbers increase.

Gehdres stressed that Huntsville Utilities is expanding the fiber network for its own reasons. As that network is completed, Google and other providers can lease excess capacity to offer their services.

Google has already signed an agreement with the utilities to do just that to bring its Gigabit speed Internet service to Huntsville. Utilities leaders believe their model - where a municipal utility builds fiber and leases some of it to Google - could be a national model for Google expansion elsewhere. The company has run into challenges in cities where it is both building the network and providing the service.

"We don't know, nor are we involved in the way Google plans to roll out service on this network," Gehdres said.