Decatur Looks to Improve Wi-Fi Service
Decatur Metro | June 20, 2011Decatur recently put out a Request for Proposals (aka RFP) “seeking an Internet Service Provider (ISP) to upgrade, operate and maintain the city’s existing municipal WiFi network.”
According to the RFP, the city is looking for an Internet Service Provider to…
(a) make recommendations about how to modify the existing network to improve performance and stability and to focus on those areas that can be served reliably;
(b) provide marketing and customer acquisition services;
(c) operate, maintain and support the network that currently serves educational, residential, commercial, and municipal customers within the City of Decatur boundaries.
If Decatur could create a reliable Wi-Fi service for around the $25/month it currently charges, it could save many of us significant amounts of money. Hopefully the city can find an ISP that’ll do just that.
BTW…I didn’t see anything about creating a Decatur Wi-Fi mobile login page in the RFP, but hopefully that’s still on the city’s radar.
h/t: InDecatur
Latest from Decaturish
Raise your hand if you actually use this service. (hand lowered)
Raise your hand if you hope this service pays for itself. (hand raised.)
I never can see the screen to create an account with my phone so I’ve never had the pleasure of trying out this service.
It’s going to be interesting to see the Business Proposal of the winning vendor.
If the price was right, and the performance good enough, I would consider using it if I could get a family plan that covered all my computers, ipods, tablets, etc.
It would be nice to be able to facetime or skype the kids when they are about town (& avoid the cell phone charges)
I would use this if it didnt suck but it does
I actually have been using this for a few months b/c I am cheap. Service is definitely spotty and slow at times, but it almost always works to some extent. I have to say it seems to have improved lately. Lately, sometimes it’s lightning fast. Other times, well . . .
I’m actually wondering if anyone has purchased the wireless modem and if that had a significant effect on the service or no.
I wish Decatur would look at migrating this to a WiMax service everywhere but in the downtown square. This would allow for a very small area where WIFI would be directly available (the square), but allow for a platform that is more suited to covering a municipal area at speeds that may be useful in the outlying neighborhoods and within residents homes.
It was a great concept but the final product sucked. I feel you should automatically be hooked up to the wifi and kicked of after 2? Hours. Or at the minimum, a very simple, FAST, login page. I never used it as it required too much work/time to use it.