Canadian City Offers Broadband Without Borders

Fredericton empowers city employees and citizens with wireless networking.

By G. Patrick Pawling
Photograph Courtesy of Fredericton Tourism

How do you turn a city in eastern Canada into a true hot spot—even during the coldest winter? Fredericton, the capital of the province of New Brunswick and home to approximately 80,000 residents, is quickly and inexpensively transforming itself into a "connected" municipality. This transformation began with the creation of e-Novations ComNet, Inc., a not-for-profit co-op telecommunications company established to bring less-expensive broadband into the city. Today, the efforts continue with a Wi-Fi network that will soon cover the vast majority of Fredericton.

The Wi-Fi project evolved because of two distinct needs. First, the city of Fredericton wanted to empower its 650 employees to work more efficiently. With employees working from 20 locations and offering 150 different city services, Fredericton city leaders knew that employees would be able to operate more efficiently—getting more work done with the same resources—if they were connected through a faster and more comprehensive network. Officials also realized that with this type of improved connectivity, it would be relatively easy to offer free citywide wireless broadband access as well, enabling anyone within the city's boundaries to connect to the Internet when and how they needed.

"From an economic development standpoint, we recognized that we needed affordable broadband access throughout the community so that our firms could grow and prosper," says Don Fitzgerald, executive director of Team Fredericton, the city's economic development department.

The first phase of the Fred-eZone project includes 110 Cisco Systems wireless stations, which provide coverage for about half the city's potential computer users. Phase two, now under way, will increase coverage to about 95%.

The wireless network has been running for more than a year, and use is increasing. For example:

	The mayor checks city e-mail from his boat.
	Students at the two local universities can find a signal nearly anywhere they want to study.
	City workers share information more easily, and the city is rolling out PDAs to make them even more efficient.

Perhaps most significant, knowledge workers across the city tap into both the free wireless and reduced-price broadband from e-Novations ComNet. Broadband prices have been reduced fivefold since the project began in 2000.

"Fredericton is striving to be the smartest city in North America,"says Maurice Gallant, manager of the city's Information & Communications Technology Division and president of the co-op. "People all over are starting to realize some leading-edge things are happening here."

The Fred-eZone initiative recently received the 2004 Canadian Information Productivity Award of Excellence for Innovation. As Fitzgerald and Gallant note, none of this would have happened without the leadership and backing of the city council.

Ongoing costs to maintain the network are low. The first phase of the project cost $150,000 and was so successful that the city provided another $300,000 to extend the scope even further. The broadband that feeds the Wi-Fi network comes from overflow bandwidth from the co-op ISP.

"Infrastructure needs continue to become more sophisticated," says Fitzgerald. "A hundred years ago, it was sidewalks and streetlights. Now that most of our firms are knowledge-based, they need a different kind of infrastructure. Intellectual infrastructure will be the differentiator of the future."

iQ Magazine, Second Quarter 2005

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