Bryan Clark

After Bruce Patterson’s success designing a network to serve the residents of Ammon (ID), he decided to depart and work to help other cities build similar open-access networks. Perhaps the most significant taker is the city of Detroit (MI) which is planning to use $10 million in funding from the American Rescue Plan Act to build a pilot open-access fiber network that will serve a neighborhood of about 3,200 households.

In eastern Idaho, two relatively small towns, Idaho Falls (population 62,000) and Ammon (16,000) have begun treating broadband as an essential service. These fairly conservative communities offer residents access to lightning-fast internet at low cost. They rely on variations of the same theme to achieve these results: public network ownership. It’s a model that’s gaining steam nationwide, with Detroit (MI) set to begin construction on a $10 million network explicitly modeled after the one engineered in tiny Ammon.

Across America, 5G mobile networks are going up, which eventually will supplant the internet backbone we use for nearly all communications. With minor changes, the Pentagon’s ongoing 5G demonstrations, 2020's appropriations to replace Chinese network equipment, and the proposed Infrastructure and Jobs Act could combine to spur deployment of open 5G architectures that would create a market for US telecommunications equipment builders and installers.