GR, Holland square off for big nod
Pete Daly

To Doug Lang, Google’s search for places to install and test ultra high-speed broadband Internet service is like one of those blockbuster novels you can’t put down.

“Right now we are consumed with being in the thick of the plot, and we don’t know what the ending is,” said Lang.

It’s not fiction, however. In February, Google announced its Fiber for Communities project. The Internet giant plans to launch an experiment “that we hope will make Internet access better and faster for everyone,” according to its Web site. Google plans to test ultra-high speed broadband networks in one or more trial locations across the country, delivering Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today — over 1 gigabit per second via fiber optic connections directly to houses.

“We'll offer service at a competitive price to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people,” according to the Google Web site.

The company has set a deadline of March 26 for interested municipalities to provide persuasive information about their communities through a Request for Information that it will use to determine where to build the network. Individuals and community groups can nominate a community, too.

The municipalities of both Grand Rapids and Holland are among the communities to have submitted or will soon forward their applications, and grassroots groups in both cities have mobilized for action.

They aren’t alone, of course. What might be called Google fiber optic mania has broken out all over the country. One town in Kansas that has applied to be a test site has enthusiastically renamed itself Google, until the March 26 deadline.

In late February, the Holland Board of Public Works announced that it will submit a response to Google’s Fiber for Communities RIF “in hopes of making the Holland area one of the first locations to receive this new cutting-edge fiber optic technology,” according to a news release.

Holland has launched the FiberTown initiative “to win our place in the program,” and even has a Take Me to FiberTown video on Youtube.com.

The Holland BPW already has fiber optic service in the city, started in 1992 to improve data communications between the municipal electrical grid substations.

“We believe that Google’s Fiber to Communities initiative is a perfect fit with the fiber optics initiatives the HBPW has implemented in the past 15 years and our strategic plan initiatives that focus on innovation in the community we serve,” said HBPW General Manager Loren Howard.

“Our community has already been named one of the happiest, most contented places in the country,” said Holland Mayor Kurt Dykstra. “Now we’re trying to become one of the best connected.”

Lang, an airline pilot who lives in Grand Rapids, said he spoke to Paul Klimas, the city’s director of information technology, a few days after Google’s announcement. He learned the Grand Rapids municipal application is well under way.

Before he became an airline pilot, Lang was a professional technician in software-related telecommunications systems for Lucent and later its Avaya spinoff. As a commercial pilot, he typically has three days off in a row, which gives him the time to get behind the campaign to have Grand Rapids selected by Google as a test site. To that end, he organized a grassroots group, Grand Rapids Technology Partnership, and created a Web site for it — www.grtp.org — to lobby on behalf of Grand Rapids in the Google competition.

“Google’s project is going to mean a lot to whatever community gets it. Our city has a fighting chance,” said Lang. He wants as many people as possible to send a “strong message” to Google that Grand Rapids is the place for it.

“We have spelled out on www.grtp.org how the public can get involved,” said Lang.

He told the Business Journal that Grand Rapids has a youthful and educated population that would appreciate the capabilities of ultra high-speed broadband access throughout the city. Plus, he said, “We have interested people that are looking forward to what’s next.”

Others involved with Lang include Ashima Saigal, director of technology at the Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Leadership at GVSU; and Rachel Lee, president of the board of the East Hills Business Association and project manager for Good Earth Properties.

Does Google expect test communities to put up the cash for the fiber optic infrastructure?

“From all the information I’ve seen, I don’t think so,” said Lang.

According to organizers of the FiberTown Initiative in Holland, a community that becomes a Google fiber optic broadband test site will learn a lot about “next generation apps” and new ways to build fiber networks, information that will be valuable to other communities throughout the country. The Holland supporters said Google has reportedly indicated it will be an “open access” network, giving users a choice among multiple Internet service providers.

Other Grand Rapidians have mobilized, too. Two employees of Mindscape at the Hanon McKendry advertising agency, including Pete Brand, set up a Google Fiber for Grand Rapids Facebook page as soon as the Google announcement went out, and a Twitter account, as well. See www.bit.ly/fiber4GR and, at Twitter, GoogleFiber4GR.

The Facebook page had more than 14,500 fans as of a few days ago, and was “currently the #1 community Facebook effort to attract Google,” according to the folks at Mindscape.

How will Google ultimately decide where to set up this grand experiment in lightning fast Internet access?

“Nobody knows but Google,” said Lang.