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07/25/2007In Minneapolis, Consistent Progress Despite Construction Challenges
When working on a large-scale municipal wireless project, it's easy to imagine that you are in a unique position — that the problems and questions that pop up are singular and discrete. While this may be true to the extent that every city has different assets and needs, it is also true that the business we engage in — namely, wiring or unwiring large swaths of social, cultural, industrial, commercial, and economic geographies — has core issues. And so, I bring a report from Minneapolis (and I encourage others to bring reports from their own projects). Maybe in airing our singular experiences, we can address the larger questions.
Minneapolis's buildout has entered its second phase. Each Phase is comprised of a number of Zones, and each Zone represents approximately one square mile. The network now covers about 12 square miles. The initial testing confirms a range from 1 to 6 MB in delivered bandwidth with low latency and jitter. The range is dependent on distance from the serving access node, specific foliage density and the strength of the receiving antennae. A T-Mobile cellular/Wi-Fi device was also tested in Phase One, Zone Five, with excellent results. I'm not sure T-Mobile will be happy to hear that, by the way.
Progress has been fairly consistent with the initial rollout plan. On the other hand, each day brings a surprise or two. On the day I returned to the office last week, I received a call informing me that an installing electrician fell from a bucket truck and was injured. I requested an accident report, a summary of safety training provided and the worker's hospital-room location. The following day, installers received additional safety training and a review of best practices before being allowed back into the field. I visited the hospital that evening and was grateful to learn that the installer was going to be fine, even though recovery would take some time. I thought broadband construction was complex, but I had to be reminded it could pose a danger.
The largest construction challenge to date has been the electrification of City vertical assets that use a banked power design. Banked power is a method of electrification that daisy chains connectivity to the power source. The result is that each asset is not individually powered, and new feeds must be placed at distances of up to 800 feet. It is expensive and time consuming, and it requires several permits. It is even more challenging if the in-place conduit between the power source and the asset is crushed. Conduit replacement is then added to the task list. As Murphy's Law was in full force, of course, that crushed conduit was often an issue.
The process of building a new network is a learning experience. We've taken the time to review progress along the way to uncover and resolve problems and to develop best practices. The City of Minneapolis has been an active partner in this process and a number of creative ideas have emerged to streamline the design, asset selection, permitting, inspection and documentation processes. As an example, the RF design to maximize the performance of the radio equipment has evolved and improved with each Zone. The final Zone in Phase One was judged to be best. Therefore, crews were assigned to rework the placement of radio in earlier Zones to bring them up to optimum levels.
As the teams complete the placement of radios in Phase Two, it's good to see improved installation durations. Now that the initial installation is complete in the core business district, crews are relieved to be working in the standard grid pattern of the City. Utility poles will be one of the primary hanging asset types used in the remainder of the construction process, and they are almost all individually powered. Six to eight crews are now working each day with a goal of adding two more crews to the field workforce. The rampup is partly because a few new problems loom on the horizon. In Phase Two, major road construction will eliminate a number of available vertical assets for nearly a year on a rolling basis, so alternative building locations must be secured for use. In Phase Three, an area of the City that includes four significant lakes, more than a dozen parks, and miles of parkways connecting them have limited vertical assets. I've asked the team to locate solar-powered artificial pine trees that we can plant. We'll see how that goes.
Construction quality is obviously a critical success factor in the implementation of a network, but at the end of the day, it will be the customer experience that matters most. This experience is not limited to a successful sign-on. It begins with awareness of the network, includes sales calls, the sign-up process, customer-service interactions, home or business installation methods, billing, change orders and customer satisfaction surveys. As the initial Zones are turned up for customers, the importance of these elements of the customer experience will move to the front and center position of everyone's radar. Some early test interactions indicate there is work to do here, and it has become an important focal point this week. Customer presentations to City Departments are now almost a daily occurrence, speeches to local business groups are becoming more regular and the search for targeted customer application partners is ramping up. Behind the scenes, workflows associated with the customer experience are being mapped, refined, remapped and refined again.
During the next several weeks, I will post shorter, more frequent entries regarding the day-to-day activities, successes, surprises and outcomes associated with bringing a network online. I invite you to offer your feedback, insights, suggestions for improvement and opinions along the way. James Farstad is President of rClient in Minneapolis. He moderates the Service-Provider Executives and Local-Government CIOs Roundtable at the W2i Digital Cities Convention.
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Related Items:
• W2i, BelAir Webinar to Explore Wi-Fi Role in Minneapolis Bridge Disaster Response
• Minneapolis Wi-Fi Works, Where it Exists
• Wireless Minneapolis Chooses US Internet
• Wireless Minneapolis: Bill Beck, Deputy CIO
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