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E-conomy / Paul Andrews
Wi-Fi 'carpet' far cry from wall to wall

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The motel you stay in may have Wi-Fi, but not the restaurant you eat in. A cafe might have it, but not your lodging. In some towns, Wi-Fi is still absent altogether.

On a recent trip to Moab, a tiny recreational outpost in southeast Utah, I was startled to find Wi-Fi at the Red Rock Bakery & Cafe.

I say "startled" because the Internet isn't big in Moab. But it shows that Wi-Fi is gradually progressing toward its ultimate dream of near-ubiquitous access.

As Wi-Fi gains popularity, it may be time to think about planning issues. Hotspots are sprouting everywhere. But they're doing so randomly, with little thought given to strategy, coordination and the long term. In some cases they're interfering with one another, hindering user access.

At a time when it would make huge sense for communities to have Internet councils — the same way they have public-works boards, chambers of commerce and zoning authorities — the notion of Wi-Fi planning is almost nonexistent among local jurisdictions.

That's too bad, because the technology is moving ahead on several fronts. Without planning, a lot of time and money stand to be wasted, to say nothing of potentially locking localities into a less-efficient or costlier approach.

I got to thinking about this while strolling down Northeast 45th Street in Wallingford the other day. Wallingford might be termed a Wi-Fi "cluster." Several hotspots exist, some next door or across the street from one another. But they're all on separate, stand-alone systems.

Contrast Wallingford with Half Moon Bay, a quiet coastal village south of San Francisco whose geographic footprint isn't much bigger than Wallingford's. Half Moon Bay has a mesh network. One system, using cells and antennas similar to a phone network, provides Wi-Fi to the whole town. You can be pretty much anywhere and pick up an Internet connection.

Think of the hotspot approach as throw rugs, and the mesh network as a carpet, and you get a rough idea of the tradeoffs. The former are more flexible and versatile, the latter more thorough.

Would a mesh network work in Wallingford or any number of other Seattle districts? If so, it would free local outlets from having to purchase and maintain their own Wi-Fi outlets.
 
Mesh has its own set of challenges. Networks tend to be proprietary, meaning that a locale would be dependent on a single vendor's technology, pricing and continued existence. From a functional standpoint, as they grow they can run into problems with multiple connections confusing or overloading nodes.

Matt Westervelt, founder of a community wireless project called SeattleWireless, puts the dilemma pithily: "Mesh is good, but mesh is hard." (Westervelt's company Metrix Communications sells Wi-Fi kits to build community networks.)

Glenn Fleishman, editor of the online Wi-Fi Networking News and author of the Practical Mac column in The Seattle Times, favors mesh and access points in a "cloud" configuration along with different Wi-Fi protocols.

Enough wireless strategies, forthcoming or available today, exist to warrant some sort of community-level coordination.

Dozens of destination towns around the Northwest — Winthrop, Port Townsend, Cle Elum, plus Ashland, Bend and Cannon Beach, Ore. — are just beginning to get into Wi-Fi.

They and metropolitan districts could benefit from a localized approach. But someone needs to step forward to raise the issue and help coordinate planning.

It might be an Internet provider. Libraries could be another starting point. Or a chamber of commerce, since Wi-Fi can be used as a tourist draw. In towns where police and fire are using Wi-Fi to communicate, elected officials have led the planning process.

Whoever steps up, the guideline of sooner rather than later applies.

Paul Andrews is a freelance technology writer and co-author of "Gates." He can be reached at pandrews@seattletimes.com