Big Easy’s Wi-Fi connection
p2p news / p2pnet: Since Hurricane Katrina savaged New Orleans in August, only about 10% of Big Easy’s pre-storm population has returned.
But, "To help boost its stalled economy," New Orleans is launching America’s first free wireless network owned and run by a major city, says the Washington Post.
"Mayor Ray Nagin said Tuesday the system would benefit residents and small businesses who still can’t get their Internet service restored over the city’s washed out telephone network, while showing the nation ‘that we are building New Orleans back’," says the story.
"The system started operation Tuesday in the central business district and French Quarter. It’s to be available throughout the city in about a year."
Nagin, "described the system as a convenience for roaming computer users, a backup for more traditional Internet services and an interim service for homes and businesses still waiting to be reconnected to telephone and cable services," says the Times-Picayune.
Big Easy W-Fi is running on the back of a fiber optic-based communications system created before the storm to operate city security video cameras on the tops of streetlights, says the story.
"More than $1 million worth of equipment for the network was donated by computer chip maker Intel and by Tropos Networks Inc., which builds municipal wireless Internet networks."
The Lake New Orleans, as the city has been dubbed, Wi-Fi service currently spans the Central Business District and Warehouse District, and will expand to the French Quarter, Uptown and Algiers over the coming weeks, Nagin said, adds the Times-Picayune.
Th captrion under Eliot Kamenitz’s Times-Picayune photo (top right) reads:
"CC’s Coffee House in New Orleans, Doss Hindman, left, John Ryan, Colleen Timmons and Ren French use a WiFi connection last month to get online. The system run by the city is to be operational today in New Orleans’s business district and the French Quarter."
Also read:-
Washington Post – Big Easy Launches Free Wireless System, November 29, 2005
Times-Picayune – N.O. hopes wireless service connects, November 30, 2005
