Pierce County is well on the way to deploying wifi county wide, even in such small burbs as Orting and Eatonville.
Spokane built their downtown network so long ago it isn’t even news anymore.
Now, Bellevue is putting their’s up.
What the heck in wrong with Olympia?
The last time anyone seriously talked about wifi within our city government, they took a “wait and see” position.
CIRGO, even though everyone mentions to me that they’re going to get us going in this direction, is still very very quiet about what they’re even going to do. Low cost wifi? Public wifi?
Yes, Olympia is missing out on Wi-Fi. That’s because the City of Olympia – the government – is ossified, fat, happy and ignorant. It is the people of Olympia who are creative, innovative, vibrant. Olympia City Government should lead, follow, or get out of the way. They don’t lead, on this and many other issues, and so they need to choose to either follow or get out of the way. The people of Olympia are waiting. . . waiting until the next election of the Mayor and members of the City Council.
Why should the city be providing wifi at all? Who actually benefits from this?
The only people I know who are wireless can afford to pay for hotspots at coffee shops while they drink their $4 lattes.
And, to their credit, Zhonka is already providing plenty of free wifi hotspots around the area.
http://zhonka.net/surfbreak/index.html
Good question, for me its an idea of a more wired city. Whereas internet connectivity is a good thing, universal access is good for all.
That said, there are also some inherent benefits to simply having a wireless city government. Wireless meter maids, wireless meter readers. Currently the connection between police car computers is about 19kps. With a wireless network that is greatly increased.
Plus, as a capital city, having a wireless network just in and around the campus greatly increases our flexibility.
Also, Olyblog has a great map of all of the current wireless hotspots:
http://olyblog.net/wireless