Thinking that you’re going to get something viable for free is a pipe dream. Maybe it’s because telecom services and network infrastructures are really a novel idea to be municipally driven in the eyes of most politicians. They think they can wheel and deal a free service for their citizenry. They should consider trying that with services with which they have more familiarity. It doesn’t work.

I don’t see many road construction companies going to the state or any municipality and saying they will lay down a couple miles of four-lane highway for free. Let’s see free garbage pickups. No service is free.

If it is somehow sold as free, there are always some other high-cost components tied with them to cover the free part. For example: “Yeah, we’ll give you two miles of free road with that order for 600 miles of concrete four lane.” “For 20 years of no competition on this route, we’ll throw in some plastic containers with your name on them.”

Let’s not forget the lawyers and other professionals. Another reader focused on the request for free consulting. He said:

There is a strange belief that knowledge and skills gained over years of investment, work and learning lessons – both good and bad – are expected to be offered up for free. Some of us are trying to make a living developing and building the community of the future and in Illinois they expect it all to be free. Good editorial!

A good network infrastructure and its designers are no different. Ask the experts. The incumbent phone companies know how much it is to run a network and they judiciously guard the whole concept of opening up to competition because they have huge costs. Giving up something in the name of competition doesn’t sit well if you start with nearly 100 percent of the market.

In exchange for a 100 percent monopoly in the old days, the municipality would get their phone service for free. Anything above that was “pay to play”. That was the extent of free.

Project UTOPIA vs. Project Schmoe

Some states are trying different models. Utah has gained some real momentum with Project UTOPIA, which has provided a great start in internetworking 14 cities with the latest and greatest fiber-optic connectivity. UTOPIA is the acronym for the Utah Telecommunications Open Infrastructure Agency.

Unlike Illinois, which recently budgeted $1 million for the Mainstreet endeavor, Utah’s Project UTOPIA has already raised $85 million in 2004 for its first phase of implementation and “plans to raise funds in the municipal markets to complete its $300 million to $400 million fiber-optic network between 14 cities,” according to executive director Paul Morris. Within its statement about why they organized is this:

Recognizing the need to provide their residents with superior communications technology infrastructure – and the reality that current service providers in the marketplace were not delivering first-tier services – the communities banded together to create a world-class, 100 percent fiber-optic network for member communities.

In Illinois, we have Project SCHMOE – or Stagecoach-era Communications Hindering Municipalities, Organizations & Employees – with many civic and business leaders still clinging to it. We need to get out of this model and into something new.

At a minimum, municipal broadband access must address bandwidth capacity, choice and reliability (redundancy). Though more people are starting to agree to that, no one has really come up with a comprehensive and cohesive plan. As far as the impending Illinois bills that try to address this, unfortunately they are not close.

With no statewide standards, getting beyond Project SCHMOE in Illinois is going to get us into a diverse patchwork of variable reliability and service levels. If you don’t think this will happen or if you haven’t even thought about this as a consequence, then you have no experience in mission-critical network infrastructure design and no business in trying to shape any policy.

UTOPIA’s Top 10 For Network Infrastructure

Utah’s Project UTOPIA has its top 10 reasons why cities should jump on board. I don’t recall anything like this for Illinois, and if we use the same top 10 for Illinois, maybe we can get everyone focused in the same direction instead of creating a “patchwork of technology islands,” which is really where Illinois is headed.

As Gen. George S. Patton once said: “A good plan executed today is better than a perfect plan executed next week.” Can we use anything from Project UTOPIA? Here is its top 10:

1. Because the economic vitality of your city may depend on how good its access is high-speed telecommunications.
2. Because the residents of your community could enjoy a higher quality of life if they had affordable access to advanced telecommunications services.
3. Because the telecommunications infrastructure that is currently available in your city does not the capacity to deliver advanced services.
4. Because business imperatives in the industry prevent private companies from making the investment any time soon that a fiber-to-the-home network will require.
5. Because building, operating and maintaining public infrastructure is a core competency for cities.
6. Because Utah law makes it possible for cities to deploy wholesale telecommunications infrastructure.
7. Because it is easier and more effective to solve a regional telecommunications infrastructure problem on a cooperative basis than on a go-it-alone basis.
8. Because the risk to member cities is very manageable.
9. Because UTOPIA cities are committed to equity throughout the network.
10. Because the UTOPIA business model has the potential to become the new standard.

Maybe some of the more progressive politicians and city administrators in Illinois can take a look at this. There are some initiatives that have started already. Aurora is one. Princeton is another. Let’s not develop a patchwork of technology islands. Standards, reliability and interconnectivity issues are paramount.

What is needed is someone with a strong vision of where things should be headed, who should be on board, what should be the final objective and the statewide authority to make it happen.

Carlinism: He who has the wheel sets the direction. ~ Malcolm Forbes

James Carlini is an adjunct professor at Northwestern University. He is also president of Carlini & Associates. Carlini can be reached at james.carlini@sbcglobal.net or 773-370-1888.
Click here for Carlini’s full biography.