The City of Dayton is building its own high-speed Internet system to provide improved download and upload speeds throughout the city. The new system, operated by the City as DayNet, is being funded by a $13.7 million bond approved by Dayton City Council last year.
Phase 1 of the project is the installation of 70 miles of fiber optic cables through the city. Once completed, 110 miles of cable will be installed. City Manager Theo Melancon estimates that 98 percent of all residents and businesses in Dayton will have the fiber optic network system available to them. Currently, Internet service for most of these areas is limited to a choice of Comcast, AT&T and satellite dishes.
Compared to these other services, DayNet should be remarkably fast and more affordable, Melancon said.
“On the residential and commercial sides, we will be providing 1 GB per second of download speed and 1 GB per second of upload speed,” he said. “As a city, we believe we have the ability to provide this service at a very reasonable cost. In the coming months we will be putting together pricing plans that we think will be very competitive for the market.”
While the city borrowed $13.7 million in bonds for construction of the high-speed Internet service, Melancon said that it appears the project will finish up closer to $12 million, a cost savings that could be used on further expansion and improvements to the service, or put back into the bond.
Melancon estimates that the project should wrap up by October 2021.
People traveling through Dayton should only experience minor interruptions as most of the work is being done underground.
“We have been working closely with the contractor to make sure there is no impact on traffic. There will be boxes installed to relay the signal but people won’t see a lot of disturbance other than that above ground,” Melancon said.
As Internet technology continues to be a part of the daily life of most Americans, Melancon realizes the importance of providing the service to as many Dayton residents as possible.
“We want to make sure that the community embraces the service. We want to be a partner as well to the school district,” Melancon said. “With COVID-19 having students learning from home, we know there is a need to be more technology focused.”
1GB or 1Gb?
Its likely 1 Gb
If anyone from the Cleveland city leadership reads this, we should invest in a municpal fiber project too! A lot of cities are doing it, like Mont Belvieu. City fiber will undercut the price of the incumbents and make it more affordable for everyone. Current incumbents have data caps which can be reached by doing Zoom for work or school, and they cherrypick the neighbrhoods. New fiber installations also rarely go out during storms, whereas satellite goes out when there’s a storm and the latency is so high that it can be reliable for real-time conferencing.
The installers caused damage to my property. I watched a Supervisor hit my mailbox. Said he would have his men fix it. Right!! Heard the cables hit my siding. Damage to 2 corner pieces. They need to fix all damage. They were in my yard all day 4/14/2021.
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