Open Letter to Google

Dear Google,
In just six short weeks, your search for locations to deploy “Google Fiber for Communities” has elevated broadband to a new level of national consciousness. Thank you for sparking much-needed discussion about our nation’s current and potential broadband capacity, and thank you for giving the Greater Lansing community this opportunity to showcase our region as an ideal location for rapid fiber deployment and broadband-related innovation.

What Makes Greater Lansing
Ideal for Rapid Fiber Deployment

Support from Local Governments

In response to your Request For Information (RFI), eight communities joined forces in an unprecedented show of intergovernmental cooperation to bring Google Fiber to Greater Lansing. We acknowledged early on that Google coming to ANY of our partner communities would be advantageous for the region, and rather than compete against one another, we pooled our resources to promote the region as a whole.

Designees from each local government met weekly to share ideas and coordinate outreach efforts. We were joined by representatives from the regional planning commission, local and regional economic development agencies, local utility companies, and Michigan State University. We even drafted our application as a Google Document!

At the same time, legislative bodies from collaborating municipalities unanimously adopted resolutions of support for the Google Fiber Initiative. Click here to view all resolutions and letters of support from community partners (including Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon).

We are committed to making fiber deployment in Greater Lansing as simple as possible, which is why we chose Kathie Dunbar as Google’s point of contact. As a grass-roots community organizer and an elected official, Dunbar has built strong relationships with government and community leaders throughout the region. She’s committed to progress and enjoys eating roadblocks for breakfast.

Support from Local Utilities

Representatives from Greater Lansing’s electrical utilities have been at the table during all phases of this application and outreach process.

Our publicly owned utility, the Lansing Board of Water and Light (BWL), owns the majority of pole infrastructure in the Greater Lansing area. Consumers Energy is a state regulated utility with poles in the outer ring of our partner communities.

BWL and Consumers have a long history of collaboration with our partner communities. They understand the impact ultra high-speed broadband will have on the region, and they are excited to work with Google to expedite the installation of this important network.

It helps that both utilities have engineers with extensive experience working with telecom and internet service providers to accommodate the construction of fiber networks on their poles. Given the volume of access anticipated if we are chosen as a test site, BWL has even offered to create a “make ready” office with engineers dedicated to future fiber deployment.

Established Fiber Companies

One of the local champions of this effort, and a key partner in drafting this proposal, is Kevin Schoen, CEO of ACD.net.  As Mid-Michigan’s largest independent phone and broadband provider, ACD owns and construct fiber optic networks throughout Lansing and across Michigan.

We invite Google to work with ACD and other local fiber companies, e.g., Arialink (Michigan’s largest direct-to-business fiber network) to create your fiber-to-the-home network in Greater Lansing.  Our local fiber providers have established working relationships with local municipalities and utilities, and they are familiar with permitting and construction regulations related to fiber services.

Existing Fiber Networks

ACD and Arialink own dark fiber routes throughout Michigan and can provide dark fiber or wavelength service to connect Google from Chicago, IL, Ann Arbor, MI, and Southfield, MI (which are the major near aggregation points). This will lower Google’s cost for fiber construction. Collocation and Regen points are available, as are DWDM transponders and regenerators. In addition, Level 3 has a handoff facility at 1205 May Street in Lansing (built by ACD), providing easy metropolitan access for fiber facilities.

ACD is also part of the Reach-3MC project collaborative with Merit Network that was recently awarded $41.6 million in federal stimulus funds to construct a 955 mile fiber-optic backbone network in 34 rural counties in Michigan. We are proud to have Merit Network’s support in our quest for Google Fiber.

Easy Access

The majority of homes in our communities are accessible via above ground pole attachments, and local utility companies are committed to working with Google. Micro-trenching is already practiced in areas where pole attachment is not an option.

Standardized Permitting

All of our partner communities opted to join the METRO Authority (PA 48 of 2002), which standardizes the permitting process for all telecom installation and maintenance in public Rights of Way.

What Makes Greater Lansing
Ideal for Broadband-Related Innovation

Economic Renaissance

Like many historic auto communities, we’re transitioning from a manufacturing economy to one driven by knowledge, life science, and technology-based industries. Rather than lament the change, we embraced the future.

Local and regional governments welcomed the opportunity to build a new economy; we created Regional Smart Zones to attract tech industries and invested heavily in high-tech workforce development. In the past three years, while other communities languished, we used numerous economic development incentives to leverage more than 600 million dollars in private business investment in Lansing alone!

Today, Greater Lansing is one of only three areas posting job growth in Michigan, and the IT sector is growing faster than any other in the region. Think we’re pullin’ your leg? Click here and see for yourself!

How much will Google’s fiber infrastructure accelerate the pace of our economic rebound? In her letter of support, MSU President Simon says, unequivocally, that “the positive rate of change this project will have on the prosperity of this region will be greater than that of any other region, in any other state.” How’s that for an endorsement? Booyah!

Talented, Innovative, Highly Skilled Workforce

Greater Lansing is home to more than 300 local IT companies, employing more than 4,500 people. We also have a host of technology “end users” like banks, insurance companies, government agencies, hospitals, and educational institutions that employ large numbers of IT professionals.

If Google wants to see what innovative applications are developed in communities with high speed broadband deployment, it can’t hurt if the vast majority of employees and researchers affiliated with local hospitals, universities, and high-tech industries (data storage, software development, biotechnology, nuclear physics) live in the very communities where we hope to deploy Google fiber. Smart, eh?

Below are just a few of the notable high-tech companies in Greater Lansing that employ our talented residents:

  • Liquid Web is the largest web hosting company in Michigan. They just moved into their new $80 million Lansing headquarters and announced they’d be hiring 600 new employees over the next 3–4 years.
  • TechSmith is the world’s #1 provider of screen capture and screen recording software for individual and professional users.
  • IBM is locating its first Global Delivery Center for Application Services on Michigan State University’s campus in East Lansing.
  • Emergent Biosolutions is an international biopharmaceutical company with BioDefense Operations in Lansing.
  • Niowave fabricates niobium components for nuclear accelerators throughout the world.
  • Neogen Corporation is an international company that develops, manufactures and markets food and animal safety products. Their world headquarters are in Lansing.
  • In 2008, the U.S. Department of Energy announced MSU won the bid for a $550 million Facility for Rare Isotope Beams that will attract top researchers from around the world to conduct experiments in nuclear science, astrophysics, rare nuclear isotopes, and the evolution of the cosmos.

Researchers and employees who work at these companies are exactly the type of people who could envision and develop applications that take advantage of increased bandwidth.

Regional Support for Entrepreneurs

Early proliferation of high-speed Internet (c.1994), coupled with the intellectual capacity of our university student populations, created a fertile environment for information technology companies to incubate and thrive. As a result, the Greater Lansing region has becoming a hub of tech-related entrepreneurial activity. Google’s high-speed fiber network will give our existing entrepreneurs a welcome boost and help attract a new talent to our community. Below is just a partial list of existing small business incubators and entrepreneurial networks that nurture emerging talent in the region.

Gen Next Appeal

Michigan’s capital city is in the midst of an economic rebirth that is luring unprecedented numbers of young, creative, tech-savvy people to the region. We keep them in the community by providing an environment with amenities they’re looking for:

  • We value and respect social, economic, cultural and lifestyle diversity.
  • We support green initiatives, and sustainability, e.g., the Lansing Board of Water & Light recently constructed the largest solar array in Michigan. Fact!
  • How about outdoor recreation? You can sled, cross-country ski, hike, bike, geo-cache, kayak, canoe, fish, swim, and feed the ducks – all within 5 minutes from home!
  • We have an extensive, nationally recognized trail system (navigable via Google maps!) that supports recreational users and non-motorized commuters.
  • Greater Lansing has more greenspace than any other urban area in the state, including award-winning botanical gardens, Fenner Arboretum, the Potter Park Zoo.
  • We offer a variety of housing options and entertainment venues, including mixed-use loft and condo development that epitomizes the urban lifestyle.
  • We even offer Xtreme sports like the Hawk Island Triathlon, Capital City Half-Marathon, Dirty Feat Adventure Race, and Over-the-Edge (repelling down the side of a 23 story building)!

Growing Market for Civic Engagement

Many of our local government agencies are embracing web-based platforms to promote civic engagement, e.g., www.Nixle.com for broadcasting information to the public and www.SeeClickFix.com for receiving input from citizens. With Google fiber, we could experiment with a variety of programs and applications to increase civic involvement in our communities, and we could be sure citizens had adequate bandwidth to take advantage of these resources.

Expertise in Social Media

MSU recently announced a monumental partnership between INgage Networks, a world leader in social media applications, and MSU’s College of Communication Arts and Sciences, renowned for its expertise in social media research. The partnership allows INgage to establish a base in Michigan, expands the capacity for social media research at MSU, and gives students real world experience.

Pamela Whitten, dean of the MSU College of Communication Arts and Sciences, says, “From research to consulting to teaching, we have a partner committed to working with MSU to cross new frontiers in the online world that are critical to economic and social development.” Add Google fiber to the mix and WhaBam! You’re crossing frontiers like hurdles in a track meet.

Expertise in Virtual Environments

MSU’s Media, Interface & Network Design (M.I.N.D.) Lab is a leading research facility for the study of human communication and interaction with computers.  When it opened, it was the only research lab in the field of communications dedicated to research on how humans communicate, work, and learn inside advanced virtual environments.  Today, MSU’s lab is part of an international network of ten M.I.N.D. Labs in seven countries.  The labs conduct conduct cognitive science and interactive design research on ways in which media and minds interact, i.e., how media form and content affect, augment, and improve human cognition and performance.

Expertise in Video Game Development

MSU’s Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies, and Media offers an interdisciplinary specialization in Game Design and Development and runs the Games for Entertainment and Learning (GEL) Lab, where students design digital game prototypes.  At the graduate level, the department also offers a Serious Game Design track focusing on games for learning, health, policy and social change. Students and faculty surely design games within the constraints of available bandwidth. What kind of prototypes could they design knowing that end users had access to greater bandwidth?

Growing Film Industry

Welcome to Hollywood, Michigan. OK, maybe that’s a bit much, but state tax incentives for movie production have dramatically increased the number of film projects in Michigan – think Gran Torino, Whip It, Red Dawn, Transformers, Semi Pro, and Dreamgirls. The year before tax credits were adopted, movie makers spent $2 million producing films in Michigan. The year after, they spent $125 million!

Greater Lansing is home to several award-winning video production companies, some of whom are collaborating with local developers to build a film studio in downtown Lansing. Having the internet capacity for high speed video transfer and real-time multi-media collaboration would increase local revenues by allowing companies to do post-production film edits in-state. Show us the fiber, and we’ll show you the money!

Potential Medical Applications

We are proud to have two university-affiliated teaching hospitals with four campuses and numerous satellite clinics and remote testing facilities in Greater Lansing. MSU is the only university in the country with three medical schools and several on-campus outpatient clinics. With better internet capacity, local physicians and medical school faculty could potentially access diagnostic imaging, real-time ultrasounds, and live feed surgical video without leaving home!

Willing Research Partners

Google wants to study the effect that increased bandwidth and speed have in their chosen communities. We have a renowned research university, MSU, who is willing to partner with Google to gather data and analyze the regional impact of gigabit fiber deployment on social networks, civic engagement, economic development, job creation, health outcomes, educational opportunities, and more.

According to the faculty proposal following President Simon’s letter of support, “If Google locates here, MSU will willingly serve as an important bulk data provider, as a community engagement and citizen outreach engine, as a creative collaborator in the planning and development of novel applications, and as a philosophical and public policy resource on key topics such as pre-competitive network roll-outs and network neutrality.” C’mon, Google! They LIVE for this stuff!

Demand for On-Line Learning

Our regional population is annually infused with more than 70,000 students enrolled at local colleges and universities. Although many students already take advantage of online classes, demand far outweighs availability. One reason is that certain classes just can’t be translated online. Classes that require, for example, 3-D simulation or access to a CAD system, must still be taken on campus. Warp speed bandwidth in residential areas surrounding our colleges and universities (where the majority of faculty and students live) would allow for a host of new remote student learning and research applications.

Community outreach is also limited because, although MSU has multi-Gbps connectivity and many programs for the outside world, those offerings are often limited by bandwidth bottlenecks between MSU and the end user. High bandwidth to individual residences and businesses would release these constraints and allow MSU to interact with the community in very different and more powerful ways.

FYI – In 2006, Michigan became the first state in the nation to make online learning a high school graduation requirement. See that? We MAKE our kids get online!

Potential for Telecommuting

In this recession economy, many companies and government agencies are looking for innovative ways to reduce facilities costs and increase efficiency, including allowing employees to work from home. Given current internet speeds available in the region, it’s highly unlikely that employers in data-rich industries could take advantage of this option. The potential for telecommuting would increase dramatically if we had the bandwidth to support it. Businesses don’t save money with telecommuting if employees spend half their time at home waiting for downloads…

Growing E-Access

The Greater Lansing region encompasses eight local municipalities, several local, state, and university libraries, and the state capital. Local and state government agencies have already created many online tools to automate governmental processes and increase the access to public information. Libraries have some e-content, including online databases, digital books, and journals. We hope that higher internet speeds and greater bandwidth will encourage new applications and create more opportunities for our residents to interface with these institutions.

Frustration with Current Capacity

#^&%*@!   Hear that?  We do! Many of our residents are frustrated with current internet capacity and the limited number of providers in the market. It’s also frustrating for those who provide content, like local online radio and bloggers. One recently posted: “We want to add live webcasts to our news site beginning this fall. But past experience makes us worry about whether enough people in the area have broadband so that they can watch.”

Region of Influence

Hey Google, if you want to convince Michigan legislators to proliferate better bandwidth, install your fiber optic network in the capital region! 38 senators and 110 representatives from across the state live in the Greater Lansing area while the legislature is in session. Give them a taste of warp-speed internet, and they won’t be able to live without it at home!

Need we say more?  Didn’t think so!

Greater Lansing Invites Google to Bring on the Bandwidth!