Locally and nationally, consumers are opting not to buy homes if they don’t have access to high-speed Internet.
The Wall Street Journal recently highlighted the topic, and Greater Chattanooga Association of Realtors President Travis Close said that residents in rural areas value high-speed Internet access just as much as people who live in city centers.
But access isn’t always available. There are still unincorporated areas of Hamilton County with limited Internet access.
Nearly one in three rural Americans lacks access to broadband Internet service, compared to one in 100 urban Americans, local officials said, citing the Federal Communications Commission‘s latest Broadband Progress Report.
The FCC defines high-speed Internet as 25 megabits per second or more. Fiber can deliver speeds of 1,000 megabits per second.
“Within the last two years, we’ve really seen a push [in a desire for high-speed Internet],” Close said. “It’s almost more important to have high-speed Internet as opposed to fiber TV.”
About Mark Milliman
Mark Milliman is a Principal Consultant at Inphotonics Research driving the adoption and assisting local governments to plan, build, operate, and lease access open-access municipal broadband networks. Additionally, he works with entrepreneurs and venture capitalists to increase the value of their intellectual capital through the creation of strategic product plans and execution of innovative marketing strategies. With more than 22 years of experience in the telecommunications industry that began at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Mark has built fiber, cable, and wireless networks around the world to deliver voice, video, and data services. His thorough knowledge of all aspects of service delivery from content creation to the design, operation, and management of the network is utilized by carriers and equipment manufacturers. Mark conceived and developed one of the industry's first multi-service provisioning platform and is multiple patent holder. He is active in the IEEE as a senior member. Mark received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Iowa State University and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.
