The nation’s need for broadband services received a boost as President Barak Obama was set to sign an executive order designed to lessen the costs of deploying broadband infrastructure along federal roadways and properties.
The order is designed to “ensure that agencies charged with managing federal properties and roads take specific steps to adopt a uniform approach for allowing broadband carriers to build networks on and through those assets and speed the delivery of connectivity to communities, businesses, and schools.” The government claims the measure could make broadband construction along those federal properties up to “90% cheaper and more efficient.”
The White House also announced it has partnered with nearly 100 entities, including 25 cities, corporate and non-profit organizations, to join with 60 national research universities to form the US Ignite public-private partnership. The US Ignite program is designed to create services utilizing a broadband network providing speeds up to 100 times faster than what is currently available.
“The new US Ignite partnership will create a national network of communities and campuses with ultra-fast, programmable broadband services, operating at speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second,” the White House noted in a statement. “This network will become a test-bed for designing and deploying next-generation applications to support national priorities areas such as education, healthcare, energy and advanced manufacturing.”
The push for broader and faster broadband connections could force a more critical eye on current mobile broadband deployments. As consumers increasingly move their broadband connections to a mobile environment, the speeds and availability of wireless connections are likely to become an area of focus.
Many industry groups applauded the move, citing the importance the order places on the need for expanding broadband connectivity and reducing deployment costs.
“A large portion of key ‘middle-mile’ telecommunications networks – including the backhaul networks that connect wireless cell towers – run along highways,” noted TIA President Grant Seiffert. “The Federal Highway Administration has found that 90% of the cost of deploying fiber-optic cable along roadways is associated with digging up and repairing the road, yet deploying broadband conduit during construction adds only 1% to the cost of highway projects.”
Wireless carriers have begin rolling out LTE-based mobile broadband services that provide network speeds in the neighborhood of 10 megabits per second, however, capacity concerns have so far limited the ability for consumers to tap into those speeds in a similar fashion to wired connections. The wireless industry has been increasingly asking for more wireless spectrum in which to serve the public’s increasing appetite for mobile broadband connections, but has so far not received a significant response from the government.
The current administration laid out goals to free up approximately 500 megahertz of new spectrum assets for the mobile space by 2020, with a more immediate plan to free up 300 megahertz of spectrum over the next five years. So far, the government has made only modest progress with those proposals, and has instead focused a lot of efforts on striving for more efficient use of current spectrum holdings.
“It is clear the administration understands the importance of broadband deployment, and the significant benefits broadband will bring to American taxpayers and the economy,” said Rural Cellular Association President and CEO Steven Berry, in a statement “The Executive Order is a smart move and a good start, but there are still a number of policy issues, such as interoperability and access to spectrum, that must be addressed in order to truly meet consumers’ needs and demand and to move toward ubiquitous mobile broadband.”
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