San Francisco Is Quietly Building an Open Access Fiber Network With Google Fiber pausing deployments to consider a pivot to wireless, San Francisco is one of several cities left standing at the altar. The city had been part of an effort by Google Fiber to deploy service to a few key locations where fiber was already deployed. But with Google Fiber apparently now fascinated with next generation wireless technologies like millimeter wave, the city is considering one of the biggest municipal broadband deployments ever conceived.

Like Seattle, San Francisco is tired of broadband being defined as being forced to choose between two companies whose service pricing and quality clearly reflect a disdain for paying customers. As such, the company is promising to connect every single home and business in the city to fiber optic broadband. A consultant's report (pdf) recently released by the city indicates that the cost of doing so would be somewhere around $1.9 billion. But the cost of that investment would result in numerous, direct benefits to the city, the report concluded. “The opportunity The City is about to present to the private sector is unprecedented,” reads the 195-page report by Maryland-based consultant Columbia Telecommunications Corporation in partnership with financial advisory firm IMG Rebel. “There has never before existed in any American community an opportunity for a private entity to lease fiber or broadband infrastructure to reach 100 percent of the homes and businesses in the community,” it adds. The effort has moved on to the bidding and planning stages, with several local companies like Monkeybrains vying for the city's attention. "We recognize that if we win, Monkeybrains customers in San Francisco will be fully consumed by the municipal fiber project and Monkeybrains as you know it will cease to exist,” Monkeybrains founder Rudy Rucker tells the San Francisco Examiner. “Alex and I are thrilled to evolve our operations into a city wide project.” A decision on who'll win the project is expected on April 30. Harvard Law Professor Susan Crawford over at Wired notes that San Franciso hopes to use the open access model where the city works to build the network, then numerous ISPs and other companies come in later to compete over the top. The FCC's own data (data promptly ignored by the agency over the years) has shown that this approach often results in faster, cheaper service. "What’s great about this suggestion is that it removes any political argument that the city is somehow undermining the private market for internet access services," Crawford argues. "At the same time, a dark fiber public-private partnership would dramatically lower the cost for the private market to do what it does best: directly serve customers in a competitive environment that, on its own, produces low costs and innovation." As is often the case, these cities wouldn't be exploring this route if they were happy with existing broadband service. Instead of offering a cheaper, better product, large ISPs like Comcast and AT&T have worked tirelessly to quite literally As is often the case, these cities wouldn't be exploring this route if they were happy with existing broadband service. Instead of offering a cheaper, better product, large ISPs like Comcast and AT&T have worked tirelessly to quite literally write and buy protectionist state law preventing locals from being able to decide on these local infrastructure issues by themselves. And incumbent ISPs' recent attacks on net neutrality and privacy have only driven an even stronger interest in community owned and operated broadband networks.







News Jump Charter Relaunches Free 60-day Internet And Wi-Fi Offer; NCTA: FCC Should Stick With 25/3 Speed Threshold; + more news Comcast Shuts Off Internet for Subs Who Were Sold Service Illegally; AT&T, Verizon Team To Stop T-Mobile 5G; + more news California Defends Its Net Neutrality Law; AT&T's Traffic Up 20% Despite Data Traffic Actually Being Down; + more news Are The Comcast-Charter X1 Talks Dead In The Water?; AT&T May Offer Phone Plans With Ads For Discounts; + more news Europe's Top Court: Net Neutrality Rules Bar Zero Rating; ViacomCBS To Rebrand CBS All Access As Paramount+; + more news Verizon To Buy Reseller TracFone For $7B; 5G Not The Competitive Threat To Cable Many Thought It Would Be; + more news MS.Wants Records From AT&T On $300M Project; Google Fiber Outages In Austin, Houston, Other Texan Cities; + more news States With The Biggest Decreases In Speed; AT&T Hopes You'll Forget Its Fight Against Accurate Maps; + more news AT&T's CEO Has A Familiar $olution To US Broadband Woes; EarthLink Files Suit Against Charter; + more news 5G Doesn't Live Up To Hype, AT&T's 5G Slower Than Its 4G; Cord-Cutting Now In 37% of Broadband Households; + more news ---------------------- this week last week most discussed

Most recommended from 27 comments



MrMaster

Rum Connoisseur

Premium Member

join:2000-12-16

St Thomas, VI 7 recommendations MrMaster Premium Member This is how it is done in USVI This is how it is setup in the USVI. Government created a private entity and then they in turn sell to ISPs. The only difference being they laid the backbone down on major parts of the islands and didn't wire everyone with fiber. This made service much more affordable. Still not on par with first world countries but far and away better than what it was before.

wavelength

CyberSec Pro

join:2015-05-22

Raleigh, NC ·Google Fiber

Juniper SRX240

Ubiquiti UniFi UAP-AC-PRO

5 recommendations wavelength Member Good idea fraught with perils The idea of a single network operated as a public network allowing ANY company to offer service over it makes the most sense.



Having dozens of separate, underutilized fiber optic networks crisscrossing cities is a nightmare and an extremely inefficient use of capital and resources.



The problem is getting it done right, done on time and under budget. If SFO embarks on this as a city owned and operated utility, it will likely fail. The best way this could be done would be to have a private sector operator finance, build it out and operate it in a carrier neutral fashion, almost like a coop.



We treat power like a natural monopoly because it does not make sense to have different sets of power lines. The same makes sense for the physical plant that underlies last mile telecommunications. travelguy

join:1999-09-03

Bismarck, ND 4 recommendations travelguy Member Deja Vu All Over Again Can you say "Project Utopia?" davidhoffman

Premium Member

join:2009-11-19

Warner Robins, GA 2 recommendations davidhoffman Premium Member S.F. FTTH Don't worry some environmental social justice warrior groups will block it on the grounds that it adversely affects the lives of cockroaches and rats. Some judge will agree. The city will have to pay $1,000,000,000 to mitigate the effects and another $1,000,000,000 to the groups that brought the lawsuit. Expect the network to be finished in about 125 years.