Carnegie Mellon Engineering Students Tapped To Help City Develop Broadband Wireless Strategy

February 7, 2007

Contact: Chriss Swaney
Carnegie Mellon University
412.268.5776

PITTSBURGH—Carnegie Mellon University’s Jon Peha and a handful of students from the Engineering and Public Policy Department will present a report today at 1:30 p.m. in the City Council chambers of the City County building about creating a city-wide broadband wireless strategy.

The 163-page report was developed by students this semester to help city decision makers better understand their options and the implications when developing a sophisticated broadband wireless access network, according to Peha, a professor of Engineering and Public Policy and Electrical and Computer Engineering at Carnegie Mellon.

“The report is designed to help the city expand its current downtown coverage to the entire city through a wireless metropolitan-area network (WIMAN) based on Wi-Fi technology,’’ Peha said.

The report is designed to explore different options that are available to the city, and the implications of those options. It analyzes the potential results of different models for deployment, including a single provider that provides wholesale services throughout the city while competing internet service providers offer retail services, and one or more providers who offer services where they are likely to make a profit. “

We investigated the extent to which these different models might be financially sustainable, the extent to which they might serve both high-income and low-income areas of Pittsburgh, and the extent to which they might yield competition among providers,’’ Peha said.

The report also examines the extent to which city government and city services might benefit from a wireless metropolitan-area network in Pittsburgh. At present, Pittsburgh’s Wi-Fi network already covers a large, 90-block area, and provides two hours of free access daily allowing users to surf at speeds comparable to a DSL modem.