Draft
Create the high-speed connection infrastructure that will bring low-impact, high-tech businesses to Moab.
Provide low-cost, high-speed Internet and cell phone access for Moab and Castle Valley. Become a rural community test site for a pilot project to providing reliable, comprehensive cell phone and Internet services at low cost.
High speed, low cost connections will create and expand new technology businesses. This will diversify the economy, bring higher paying jobs to Moab – all with a smaller footprint on the land than most new businesses.
Many people come to Moab to get away from the TV, cell phone and email. Moab can be “Unplugged and Unforgettable.” That’s good – and it’s even worth encouraging people to leave the technology world behind, have a good time, relax, and just talk to other people in person. Even local people want to get away from technology from time-to-time.
However, we are now a connected nation. More and more businesses depend on technology. Moab already offers some of the new technology such as DSL, cable modems, wireless Internet, cell phone coverage, satellite and cable TV. Many businesses offer WiFi or Ethernet connections and Internet services. One Moab photo business takes photos of rafters, beams them from remote locations, and puts the photos on the web sites of river companies before people get off of the rafts.
However, the best technologies are still expensive and rare. For example, South Korean Internet access is three times as fast as what we have in Moab and it only costs $25 a month. Even more surprising, 80% of Koreans have high-speed Internet access.
There are many promising new technologies for connecting communities – one of those is called WiMAX. It is a wireless high quality alternative to DSL and cable modems. Better than WiFi, it has a range of up to 30 miles and goes around buildings and hills. It can offer complete cell phone and Internet coverage for Moab, Castle Valley, and Spanish Valley at a lower price than today’s options.
Intel and other large tech companies are developing the WiMAX standards in a process similar to the development of the WiFi standards. Seattle is a test site for the standards.
WiMAX also is a VOIP (voice over internet protocol) alternative to standard long distance phones and cell phones. Nokia plans to launch a WiMAX cell phone in 2005. It solves the quality problem of past VOIP phones by giving bandwidth priority to phone calls while still providing lower bandwidth to residential internet users.
Business Week noted that this year’s Sundance Film Festival in Park City beamed a film in real time by WiMAX to screens and laptops up to 11 miles away.