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Town-Wide Broadband Project

This is a short summary of the Town-Wide Broadband Project which has brought modern, high-speed Internet service to over 90% of the Town of Keene.

Keene Town-Wide Broadband Project

Goals:  To enable everyone in our rural town to connect to high-speed Internet (universal service).  This will open up a source of good telecommuter jobs for town residents.  Access to more jobs will enable more families to live here and put their children in our K-12 public school.  With all student families connected on broadband, children will have new opportunities for learning and parents will have new ways to tie into their children’s education.

Summary: The High Peaks Education Foundation, in a public-private partnership with the locally-owned ISP, Keene Valley Video and Internet, rebuilt the old CATV plant and expanded the network using fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) technology.  Key facts:

• 97% of year-round homes can get broadband if they want it, 75% are connected including all homes with Keene Central School students, teachers and staff.
• 80% of part-time homes can get broadband.  40% are now connected and the number is growing.
• We spent $11,500 per mile, only 1/3 or normal industry estimates.  But this came to $1700 per new potential subscriber, 2x an urban area, and $2150 per actual new subscriber (although this will decline as new customers continue to subscribe.

Keene now has the most widespread network in the Adirondack Park.  No other town is even close.  Use this NY State broadband map to find out if there is service on your street.

The service provider, Keene Valley Video and Internet, is continuing to upgrade the speeds (now 1-3 megabits) and make the service more robust.  In addition to the school, many people are adopting VoIP phones to replace their Verizon landlines and using various online movie rental services like Netflix and Roku.

At the bottom of this page, please see the link to the final report which explains how this was accomplished and advice for other towns considering such a project.

Jim Herman and Dave Mason, Project Co-Directors  (jim12942@gmail.com, dave12942@gmail.com, 518-576-9791)