Advocates of wireless broadband see it as a way to attract high-technology businesses and jobs.

By FRANK DELANO

Date published: 10/27/2004

Wireless broadband discussed for Northern Neck

Alex Equiguren dreams of a day when he can open his laptop anywhere on the Northern Neck and connect wirelessly to the Internet at high speed.

All that is required, the technology assistant at the Northern Neck District Planning Commission says, is required is a partnership of local governments willing to spend a few hundred-thousand dollars for some towers and wireless equipment, a few Internet service providers to market the system, and a few hundred subscribers willing to pay a $29-a-month subscription fee.

Northern Neck advocates of wireless broadband see it as a way to enhance economic development by attracting high-technology businesses and jobs.

In just 18 months, Equiguren says, Northern Neckers could be flying on the information superhighway, even if traffic is stalled behind farm tractors on rural roads in Westmoreland, Richmond, Northumberland and Lancaster counties.

Equiguren's wireless dream is already a reality in other places.

Many college campuses have wireless systems. Philadelphia has committed to a $15 million broadband system to bring wireless Internet service to the entire city. San Francisco may follow.

And if Dickenson County in Southwest Virginia can do it, why not the economically disadvantaged Northern Neck?

In 2003, Dickenson became the first county in Virginia to begin installation of a wireless network. Five towers, $600,000, and 100 customers later, the system covers about 270 of the county's mountainous 325 square miles, said Mark Cvetnich, director of operations.

Like their Dickenson counterparts, Northern Neck advocates of wireless broadband see it as a way to enhance economic development by attracting high-technology businesses and jobs.

"It used to be that inferior transportation was considered to be the biggest detriment to economic development in the Northern Neck. Now we think it's the lack of high-speed Internet," says Lancaster County Administrator William H. Pennell Jr.

Pennell also is chairman of NeckTech, an economic development initiative of the planning district. NeckTech was founded in 2003 by a $25,000 grant from the Verizon Foundation and a $15,000 grant from the Virginia Center for Innovative Technology to stimulate business interest in broadband.

Pennell has been visiting local councils and boards of supervisors this month to build support for a wireless network. He again pitched the idea at a Planning District meeting this week at Stratford Hall.

Date published: 10/27/2004