City of Bellevue Makes Pitch for Google Broadband

Almost a month after we encouraged our readers on Twitter to nominate Bellevue for ‘ultra-high speed broadband’ from Google, the city of Bellevue is pursuing the offer by Google to make Internet service available to both homes and businesses up to 100 times faster than the current standard. Building the network would allow users to move information over the Internet at the rate of 1 gigabit per second.

The city is asking residents to show support for the project by logging onto the project website and filling out a survey, making a comment on the city’s Facebook page, or uploading a short video to YouTube that expresses support for the Google project.

Google’s Fiber for Communities project is an experiment for new ways to help make Internet access faster for residents and businesses. Some of the benefits mentioned by the city include:

• Movie downloads: At a speed of 1 gigabit per second, film buffs could download a high-quality movie in as little as 8 seconds.
• Increased competition: An ‘open-access’ broadband network like the one Google proposes would provide access to multiple service providers, promoting competition and helping consumers.
• Tele-everything: A fiber-optic network opens up the possibility of more efficient telecommuting; high-definition video conferencing, new interactions among students and teachers, and streaming medical imaging over the web.
• Economic development: New applications not even dreamed up yet could boost the prospects for entrepreneurs and small businesses.
• Intelligent Transportation system: Fiber connecting the city’s network of traffic signals would offer new possibilities for managing Bellevue’s transportation system more efficiently.

Here is a video produced by Google explaining the experimental Fiber Network: