Chattanooga – SomeGadgetGuy

April 13, 2017

Tennessee approves $45 Million for Broadband, but no Gigabit Fiber? Why?

Home to one of the most successful experiments in municipal funded broadband, Tennessee is working diligently to prevent that experiment from improving data and energy infrastructure throughout the rest of the state. Now a new bill will fund ISP’s through tax payer funds, instead of expanding on city funded fiber? Why?

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Continue reading “Tennessee approves $45 Million for Broadband, but no Gigabit Fiber? Why?”

October 16, 2015

Chattanooga Increases Fiber Internet Speeds to 10Gbps

In covering the state of broadband internet access in the United States, we’ve been seeing pockets of incredible speed increases. Usually built on projects like Google Fiber, or communities coming together to fund their own fiber roll out paid for by taxes and grants.

Chattanooga Tennessee was the first city in the United States to offer up true gigabit fiber internet to consumers and businesses. Today they become the third city in America to offer a 10 Gigabit per second data speed, following Springfield Vermont and Salisbury North Carolina. None of these offerings are supplied by traditional cable or fiber providers like Comcast or Verizon. Continue reading “Chattanooga Increases Fiber Internet Speeds to 10Gbps”

August 9, 2014

Mayor of Chattanooga Does Reddit AMA on Providing Community Funded Fiber Broadband

It’s been an ongoing debate, now focused on State vs Federal rights. Should the FCC have the right to circumvent state law, to help smaller communities provide broadband data to their residents.

Chattanooga TN has become a poster child for how to rollout gigabit fiber paid with public funds, beating Google Fiber to gigabit speeds in 2010, but state law prevents the project from expanding into other communities. Four years after Chattanooga reached gigabit, most large cable broadband markets still struggle to reach one tenth the network speed of “Gig City”, and most consumers pay significantly more for slower broadband.

The city could also become the first piece of a new smart energy grid for the country.

Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke and Harold DePriest, CEO of EPB (Chattanooga’s electric company which manages the broadband project) took to Reddit to answer questions about how the project has impacted their residents. It’s an interesting discussion, delving into the politics of dealing with the FCC and State governments, but if your data is slow in your area, seeing speedtests like the one linked from the AMA might break your heart a little bit.