Grant Funding

Wed Jan 20 00:01:01 UTC 2010

On Jan 19, 2010, at 4:26 PM, Fletcher Kittredge wrote:

> 
> What do you want to know?   We were the first NTIA grant announced.    $32 million project to build rural *dark* fiber networks.   The model was to form a new company which would be carrier neutral and just build and maintain rural dark fiber.   A carrier's carrier;  structural separation; prices based on cost plus margin, not what the market would bear, open access, non-discrimination....  This model seemed to resonate with the Feds.    The local incumbents still seem to have a hard time believing we would get a government subsidy and then immediately give it away.   A model where any carrier, including them, could have access to dark fiber on equal terms is beyond their ken.
> 

This is similar to what I have been doing research on.  I wonder if the cellular coverage outside the I-95 corridor will get better as a result of your efforts...

I really should have gotten fed up with my local [ineffective] incumbents with enough time to develop a similar approach.

I do wonder if the upcoming FCC broadband work will result in a similar policy being adopted.  "We're all just overlay networks of the fiber" is a nice approach.

- Jared