ROAMING STEILACOOM –At the picnic table closest to Chambers Bay here at Sunnyside Park, I can see the ferry loading up for a trip to Anderson Island, two young lovers smooching on the swing set, an elderly gentleman walking his white poodle and the public works brush cutter slowly mowing the spring weeds along the shoulder of Lafayette Avenue.
But I can’t see the one-square-mile cloud now hovering over Steilacoom that allows me to scour the Internet, check my e-mail and file this column – wirelessly – from a beachside park on a sunny day.
Tough duty, but someone has to bring you the eyewitness news that CenturyTel has unofficially launched its first, modest Wi-Fi cloud of an eventual mammoth wireless cloud covering nearly all of Pierce County.
Note to Orting: You’re next.
Come out with your wireless-enabled computer, try it free – for now – and help shake out the bugs and identify dead zones.
The official 60-day test phase, by contract between the town and CenturyTel, doesn’t start until Mayor Ron Lucas says so. But the system that will serve as the county’s test-bed works. And Lucas says he’ll probably give the word by the end of April.
Not all of Steilacoom’s accoutrements have gone live yet – the webcams and laptops in the police patrol cars and the webcam at the ferry dock.
Here at the park, for you technically savvy Internet surfers, the connection speed hovers around 300 kbps – or the rough equivalent of a DSL connection through the phone company.
Inside The Bair Restaurant, while I washed down a ham-and-cheese omelet with coffee for breakfast, I recorded a slightly higher connection speed.
Folks should know, Mayor Lucas said, this Wi-Fi cloud works on line-of-sight signals between white radio transmitters the size of small traffic cones mounted atop streetlight poles. Consequently, users should get their strongest signals outside and weaker ones inside.
“Some people, if they have their (home) computers in a back room or a basement, may have to move them closer to a window,” Lucas said.
And if you live in a building covered with stucco over wire mesh, you may not get a signal at all.
Yet Steilacoom’s hilly terrain and trees make an ideal test-bed for the Wi-Fi network, said Bill Oltman, executive director of the Rainier Communications Commission, which brokered the countywide deal with CenturyTel.
During the test phase, the RCC will bring its remote television truck to Steilacoom and test the transmission quality of a live video feed over the network. The Pierce County Assessor-Treasurer office will test whether computer pen tablets used by its property appraisers in the field can connect with the office. And Steilacoom will find out whether it can remotely monitor its sewage pump station operations over the wireless network.
Oltman also wonders whether boaters passing between Steilacoom and Fox Island can tap into the wireless signal. The radio transmitters along Steilacoom’s waterfront beam their signal across the water to a hard-wired CenturyTel unit on Fox Island.
Once the free test period expires near the end of June, CenturyTel plans to institute a subscription and payment plan. That plan will provide the highest speed subscriptions for business uses with a more moderate connection speed for residents. But the company has not released information about subscription rates.
By agreement with the RCC, CenturyTel will provide some measure of free access at slower speeds, although details, such as time limits remain undecided, Oltman said.
But for now, if you have your computer with you while you sit in line waiting for the Anderson Island or Ketron Island ferries, you can get a signal stronger than 2.1 mbps – good enough to download video.
The only disappointment I could find during two days of testing? I couldn’t pick up a CenturyTel signal at the Steilacoom Deli & Pub. You’ll have to do something about that, Mayor Lucas.
Dan Voelpel: 253-597-8785
dan.voelpel@thenewstribune.com
Test Steilacoom’s Wi-Fi Cloud
To log on (when in town): Go to www.steilacoomwifi.com.
To report bugs, dead zones, problems, connection speeds and feedback: E-mail the Rainier Communications Commission at pcrcc@co.pierce.wa.us.
To test your connection speed while logged on: Go to www.speakeasy.net/speedtest.
Cost: Free access through about the end of June
