An editorial from The Herald-Dispatch
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Using a method that has its roots in older technology could help Huntington become one of the leaders in providing wireless Internet access to a portion of its residents and businesses.
Through participation in a pilot program, the city this summer plans to start offering a wireless Internet service in its downtown area that can be picked up by any device capable of connecting to Wi-Fi. The system will use unused broadcasting frequencies, the kind that television stations formerly transmitted before going digital and are called “white space,” and convert them to wireless Internet signals.
Under the system planned in Huntington, the main transmission hub will be on the Marshall University campus. Antennas placed around the city will pick up the signal broadcast from the hub, with the idea of blanketing the downtown area with the signal.
Besides Marshall’s participation, the pilot project is made possible through the West Virginia Network for Educational Telecomputing, or WVNET, and the state’s Higher Education Policy Commission. The translation of the broadcasting frequencies into a wireless Internet signal has been done successfully at West Virginia University, so now the two organizations are eager to see it tried on a larger scale, said Dan O’Hanlon, director of WVNET and vice chancellor for technology at the Higher Education Policy Commission.
Huntington is an eager partner…
