A 3,400 miles fiber optic network will be built in Kentucky
State and private officials announced on Monday, August 31st, that the construction will start this year and is planned to be finished by the middle of 2016 in eastern Kentucky, and eventually it will reach all 120 counties of the state.
After three years of negotiations extended by Kentucky’s political and geographic rivalries, state and private officials revealed the project will cost about 324 million $. Private investors will pay 270.5 million $ and the rest will be paid by tax payers.
Officials assured this network will be one of the country’s fastest networks, and that’s a lot to say considering it is going to be built in one of America’s worst areas for access to high speed Internet. Kentucky will own the network, but it will be operated for the next 30 years by Macquarie Group, an Australian investment firm.
This will benefit the almost 3 million Internet users from Kentucky, state that right now has the second slowest Internet Speed of the country with an average of 7.3 mbps in contrast with United States average 11.9 mbps, due to the lack of mass Internet providers. A large part of the state doesn’t even have broadband.
During the announcement in Hazard, people watched how the CEO of a telecom showed how his company can build networks able to download a video in five milliseconds. People also watched how telemedicine made it possible for a pregnant woman to be examined and get an ultrasound by a doctor in Lexington, about 100 miles away. These are the vantages officials say fiber optic network will bring to Kentucky.
Are you from Kentucky? Do you see more benefits in this fiber optic cable network? Tell us!
Source: Fox Business
