Infrastructure

Benton Senior Fellow Jonathan Sallet:  To say that advanced broadband services are being deployed to all Americans on a “reasonable and timely basis” is to ignore the rapidly changing reality of how Americans work, live, learn, socialize, and receive healthcare — all through home broadband connections. The FCC’s analysis is woefully inadequate:

The Federal Communications is charged with “encourag[ing] the deployment on a reasonable and timely basis of advanced telecommunications capability to all Americans . . . by removing barriers to infrastructure investment and by promoting competition in the telecommunications market.” Available evidence demonstrates that the digital divide continues to narrow as more Americans than ever before have access to high-speed broadband.

Companies that deploy fiber broadband networks are seeing increased demand for their services. The pandemic is highlighting the need for faster uplink speeds, according to Adtran's Gary Bolton. “Video conferences are symmetric, and on a cable network you are lucky to have a [megabit] of upstream,” he said. “The need for fiber infrastructure is greater than ever.” Bolton thinks the current situation will have a lasting impact on demand for broadband. “When we get back to 'normal' it is not going to be the world we once knew,” Bolton said. “More people realize they need broadband. ....

The Federal Communications Commission adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking seeking comment on establishing the 5G Fund for Rural America. The Notice proposes to distribute up to $9 billion through the Universal Service Fund across rural America for 5G wireless broadband connectivity. The 5G Fund would help ensure that rural Americans enjoy the same benefits from our increasingly digital economy as their urban counterparts—more than 200 million of whom already have access to major providers’ 5G networks—and would include a special focus on deployments that support precision agriculture.

The Internet itself is being tested like never before. To understand how these challenges are testing, more than ever, both the Internet’s technical foundation and the society that relies on it, the Center for Data and Computing (CDAC) is launching a new initiative to deploy our expertise and collaborative relationships towards studying how this pandemic has affected the Internet network — how it is responding globally, and how well local communities are able to make use of it.

Our two most recent reports seemed to indicate that networks were slowly adjusting to the newfound demand being placed on them, but this week, these improvements have, in some cases, slowed to a crawl:

The coronavirus pandemic is boosting momentum for major broadband legislation, highlighting the widespread lack of high-speed internet in US homes at a time when it has become more essential than ever. Leading lawmakers of both parties say the long-delayed issue of closing the so-called digital divide is gaining new prominence, as Washington weighs initiatives to help speed economic recovery and improve US competitiveness. “Having affordable broadband—it’s not a luxury, it’s a necessity,” said House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Mike Doyle (D-PA).

It’s been about a decade now since EPB, the public electric utility in Chattanooga (TN), made headlines with plans to make gigabit broadband available to all citizens. As gigabit service becomes more commonplace, there is a real question whether gigabit alone is enough to create the next Chattanooga.

Internet outages became a distant memory in April as a good chunk of western Colorado turned on a new broadband system. But this wasn’t built by a typical telecommunications company. It took a band of local governments and partners from 14 rural communities to stitch together the 481-mile network, dubbed “Project Thor.” Communities from Aspen to Meeker craved better access and affordability but also demanded reliability.

In late Oct 2019, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society released a report that explores how leaders at all levels of government can push toward a more connected future. One of the key findings is that state governments must play a crucial role in expanding Americans’ access to broadband services. The report, Broadband for America’s Future: A Vision for the 2020s, examines ways that policymakers at all levels of government can help expand reliable broadband access to every American by the end of the decade.