Apologies for regurgitating a press release, not terribly good blog style. But hopefully this will be of interest to some.
Wireless Toronto welcomes news of Toronto Hydro WiFi Plan, hopes for Public Consultation
TORONTO, March 8 – (http://wirelesstoronto.ca/blog/)
Local community group Wireless Toronto has expressed a positive response to yesterday’s Toronto Hydro announcement.
The group sees Toronto Hydro Telecom’s plan to blanket Toronto’s downtown core with WiFi as an ambitious one with far-reaching consequences. Bearing close resemblance to municipal wireless initiatives in Philadelphia and San Francisco, Toronto Hydro’s plan expands the local internet access market.
Gabe Sawhney, a volunteer from Wireless Toronto says, “In addition to having important economic implications for individual consumers and businesses, the new availability of wireless access enabled by the proposed mesh architecture in areas of the city that currently have little or no access, is of key importance. The blanketing of the downtown core with seamless, and lower-cost network access opens the door to exciting opportunities for innovation and improved access among local residents, community groups, artists, and small businesses.”
Focused on exploring ways free wireless networking technology can be used in interesting and innovative ways, Wireless Toronto is excited to hear further details from Toronto Hydro. In particular, Wireless Toronto looks forward to a process of public consultation that engages a variety of stakeholders affected by this initiative.
A non-profit, all-volunteer community group dedicated to encouraging no-cost public access to WiFi in public spaces, Wireless Toronto has a growing network of community-based hotspots across the GTA.
Once complete, Toronto Hydro’s WiFi zone will be Canada’s largest. Currently, the city’s largest public WiFi hotspot is at St. Lawrence Market, launched in November 2005 by Wireless Toronto and the South Market Tenant’s Association, and it is free to use. A full list of other free WiFi hotspots offered by Wireless Toronto can be found at: http://wirelesstoronto.ca, and an in-depth blog discussion of the proposed Toronto Hydro plan can be found at http://wirelesstoronto.ca/blog/
For more information contact:
Gabe Sawhney, gabe – at – pwd – dot – ca
or
Hanna Cho, hanna – at – wirelesstoronto – dot – ca
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I read the press release from Toronto Hydro, and it seems like a very good, although ambitious plan. But I’m concerned when they state that after the 6 month free trial the service will be offered at “competitive rates”. If competitive is the sort of fees other providers are charging, then we’re just going to end up with a Hotspot style network, but it will be too expensive from everywhere, not just from inside a cafe.
There is nothing wrong (imho) with using a commercial band to provide a fee-based service such as GPRS or EVDO. But when unlicenced bands are used for commercial service, that really is nasty because these are the only bands that ordinary people have access to.
If in exchange for allowing large-scale services like this, more bands open up for use by unlicenced services, then that’s fine. Or if these services are offered for free, or for a very low cost, then that would also be fine. But I’m tired of price gouging for services that really are very inexpensive to set up and operate.
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I understood this was to be up and running this week (Sep 7 or 9). Does anyone know how/whether one registers for this? I checked the Toronto Hydro web site and see nothing.
The press launch for the first phase of the Toronto Hydro Telecom wireless service is scheduled for today (Wednesday 6th) so I would expect to see details coming out soon after that.