Can you hear me now? Looks like we can say good riddance to Comcast Xfinity and say hello to better service with Verizon! Mayor Marty Walsh announced on Tuesday a new partnership with Verizon to make it one of the most technologically advanced cities in the country! Replacing copper-based infrastructure with a new fiber optic network platform, will help improve our bandwidth and speeds. Thank God!
Should Southie get this new technology first? Well, if you vote for us maybe we will! All neighborhood residents and small businesses will have a voice in which neighborhoods will get the technology first. A free online registration process will be used to assess demand and help Verizon prioritize its fiber-optic network construction schedule. Residents and businesses should visit www.verizon.com/BostonFiber to register and cast their vote, beginning with the Dorchester, West Roxbury and Dudley square area neighborhoods.
See article written by Mayor Martin Walsh:
Boston is going Fiber
Last week I announced something that will change Boston’s future: working closely with the City over the next six years, Verizon will rewire the entire city with an advanced fiber-optic network.
Replacing our outdated copper-based telecom infrastructure with state-of-the-art fiber will dramatically improve internet connection speeds for both residents and businesses and increased competition will help the city reach its goal of ensuring that every resident has expanded access to broadband. This upgrade will help students, seniors, small businesses, and innovators of all kinds. The bottom line is, it’s going to place Boston at the leading edge of technological firepower, and technological access, now and as we move into the future.
I want to thank Verizon for committing more than $300 million to this investment in the City of Boston. And I want to thank them for committing to a roll-out that starts in the neighborhoods of Boston where access is needed most.
I knew when I took office over 2 years ago that our city faced a disconnect. Boston is home to some of the brightest minds and best talent. But our infrastructure—the engine that makes innovation possible—lags behind. It’s insufficient for the 21st century leader that we are becoming. So we made fiber a priority. We forged a strong partnership with Verizon. And together we crafted a plan that is fair and practical, yet bold and ambitious. We’re going to go from lagging behind to leading the pack.
Our first priority was to make this service available all over the city. We’ve been working to extend the innovation economy beyond the Seaport and Downtown, with investments like Wicked Free Wi-Fi in our Main Street districts, and startup support at the Roxbury Innovation Center. Likewise, our fiber optic rollout will begin, this year, in Dudley Square as well as Dorchester and West Roxbury. Next we’ll upgrade Hyde Park, Mattapan, greater Roxbury, and Jamaica Plain. The rest of the neighborhoods will follow. By 2022, residents and businesses across the city will be able to benefit from the state-of-the-art fiber optic connection.
Our partnership with Verizon is going to make Boston a smarter and more equitable city right away. For example, Verizon is donating $100,000 to support a mobile hotspot lending program at the Boston Public Library, bringing free internet access to families who need it the most. In addition, we’ll work together on a range of “smart city” technologies to upgrade the way Boston moves and works. We’ll start with sensors to improve safety along Mass. Ave., as part of our Vision Zero goal to eliminate fatal crashes. This fiber optic network will also support improvements to wireless coverage in Boston—so our smartphones and mobile devices always stay connected.
As our fiber network takes shape, the opportunities will only grow. And the infrastructure will not be static. It will be a platform for embracing—or inventing—whatever comes next.
That’s only fitting for Boston. We have a proud legacy of punching far above our weight when it comes to innovation. Our revolutionary history encompasses both new ideas and new progress in social equality. This fiber optic network will help ensure we live up to that legacy, with resources that can support our highest aspirations. And those are dreams we don’t even know about yet. They will come from the newly empowered—and accelerated—imaginations of our students, our entrepreneurs, and our innovators across the city.
All neighborhood residents and small businesses will have a voice in which neighborhoods get fiber-optic technology first. A free online registration process will be used to assess demand and help Verizon prioritize its fiber-optic network construction schedule. Residents and businesses should visit www.verizon.com/BostonFiber to register and cast their vote, beginning with the Dorchester, West Roxbury and Dudley square area neighborhoods.
Now that GE is coming to Boston on the city taxpayer’s dime, the carpetbaggers coming with the company, who are getting tax breaks and mortgage assistance that it’s residents don’t get, are now getting the wireless service they have been accustomed to also. None of this is for Boston residents. It’s all for the big business boys. Don’t let the smoke and mirrors of the Dorchester, Roxbury, rollout fool you. Boston isn’t for Bostonians. It’s for the transients, lobbyists, politicians, and developers. We were sold out a long time ago.
Dear Mayor Walsh and Governor Baker,
This is great news however, Verizon is ‘nickel & diming’ their workers again and trying to whittle away their health benefits. These workers are our families, friends, and neighbors, your constituents. Verizon’s CEO makes a salary of $18million -plus bonuses, which he’ll receive a significant bonus when he exports all customer call service to the Philippines.
This is wrong and it’s time to redirect these “To Big to Fail Businesses.” It’s time to stand up for the working person.