Wardens’ Caucus awards second Internet project contract
Administrator | Nov 28, 2011 | Comments 3
The Eastern Ontario Wardens’ Caucus has awarded its second Local Access Contract in its bid to allow nearly 80,000 homes and businesses to connect wirelessly to high-speed Internet across a region that includes all of Prince Edward County, most of the southern half of Hastings and Lennox and Addington Counties and a westerly portion of Frontenac County.
The service is to be available by fall 2012.
As part of the contract, Xplornet Communications Inc. will expand its fixed wireless network to reach an area of some 7,000 square kilometres. This is Xplornet’s second access contract with the project.
“It covers one of our largest and most populous zones,” said J. Murray Jones, Chair of the EOWC. “Not only will it improve service to surrounding rural areas, many residents will also see improved high speed access.”
This is the second of several contracts to be awarded to deliver high-speed Internet as part of the Eastern Ontario regional broadband project.
The $170 million project is funded by federal, provincial and municipal governments and private sector investment. Work to build the 5,500-km fibre optic network is under way and a contract has also been signed to deliver high-speed via satellite “at improved pricing”.
“With this contract, we’ve taken another important step toward the building of a new regional network that will allow our residents and businesses to prosper,” added Dave Burton, Chair of Eastern Ontario Regional Network Inc. (EORN). “Connecting to the Internet with higher speeds will open new doors for our communities in terms of quality of life and economic growth.”
“Xplornet is pleased to be able to expand access to fast, affordable broadband Internet across Eastern Ontario through this investment in wireless infrastructure” said John Maduri, CEO of Xplornet Communications Inc.
EORN is a not-for-profit organization established by the EOWC to manage all contracts awarded as part of the project.
Once up and running in fall 2012, a variety of service packages will be offered, ranging from 1.5 Mbps to up to 10 Mbps. These speeds will enable users to stream video and use other innovative applications that will support various sectors, including business, health and education.
Filed Under: Local News
@Dan very true. I have been on Xplornet in Foxboro for over 2 years on their 3Mbps plan and my house is about 400m from the tower.
About once a week it will go over 1Mbps but the average download speed is between100-400Kbps. Even after I paid an additional 10 dollars a month for a static IP address to reduce the many hours of troubleshooting every month I still have very hit or miss service.
Even right now, I am using my Rogers 3G connection as my home connection through Xplornet is making me time out during web searches or attempting to open pages.
Now thanks to this $170M project, in another year I will have access to a more expensive plan through Xplornet that adds data caps (I read the new plans they are offering for the first region to get this) and provides me countless hours of headaches and troubleshooting. Even if my area qualified for the 10Mbps plan, I would be seeing 1-2Mbps when it works.
Thank you to a lack of competition that allowed the provider that is the problem for poor service for many Internet customers in Hastings & Prince Edward County to be given money to be the ‘saviour’ to that problem.
I only hope the back haul infrastructure makes a big difference.
just keep it away from rogers and bell or you’ll get rip off big time !
Everything looks good in print. Don’t count on the 10Mbps. I wouldn’t even count on 1.5 Mbps. They have so called fair use policies that make surfIng challenging. Bell dial up hike slow is at least consistent.