Surf City: Internet battle zone

Dave Brooks

Surf City will soon become the battleground for a new high-speed

Internet service that ranks as the fastest of its kind in the

country.

Months after Verizon announced plans to make Huntington Beach the

first West Coast location to roll out a 5-megabit-per-second Internet

service, rival Time Warner officials informed Huntington Beach

customers earlier this month of plans to upgrade its service to the

same speed without raising the price.

“It appears to be a fierce competition,” Public Works Project

Manager Gail Pickart said.

Huntington Beach is now the only city nationwide where residents

have two options for the Internet service that is three to four times

faster than DSL, officials with both companies said. The vast

majority of cities in the U.S. can’t yet access either technology.

Internet users who simply surf the Web won’t be able to tell much

difference between DSL and the new technology; but downloading will

be greatly enhanced, Verizon spokesperson Jon Davies said. E-mailing

digital photographs, downloading videogames and music and on-demand

entertainment will be much quicker under the new technology.

Time Warner spokesman Deane Leavenworth said the company’s

decision to upgrade the service wasn’t connected to the Verizon

rollout, but an attempt to meet the demands of its Southern

California customers.

“Speeds are increasing and we’re trying to keep pace,” he said.

As for choosing Huntington Beach for the upgrade -- the first West

Coast city that Verizon launched its new service -- Leavenworth said

the reason was simple; Time Warner was here first.

“We’ve been well aware of our customers in Huntington Beach for

quite sometime, prior to Verizon’s interest in them,” he said. “We

don’t run around reacting to other companies.

Both companies say that Huntington Beach is the prime location to

test out high-speed Internet service: it’s large and affluent city

with a penchant for technology.

Verizonis undeterred by Time Warner’s decision, spokesperson

Davies said.

“We’ve made a commitment to roll out our service and we’re going

to stick with it,” he said.

An obvious disadvantage for Verizon is that Time Warner already

has the infrastructure for its system installed. Verizon workers, on

the other hand, have been working on city streets all over town to

outfit homes with the new fiber optic technology.

Nearly every street with below-ground utilities will be affected

by the work, said Pickart. That includes jackhammering and removing

sections of the street and sidewalk, installation of the wiring and

then patching and repaving parts of the street.

“The city is working hard to make sure the project doesn’t get too

spread out, and Verizon is not able to finish itself and clean up,”

he said.

The Verizon project has hit some roadblocks. In September, the

City Council had to rescue the program after the city’s Design Review

Board rejected an application by Verizon to install about 150 utility

boxes throughout Huntington Beach. Board member Robert Eberle said

the boxes, which look like file cabinets, were ugly and didn’t match

the character of Huntington Beach. The ruling was appealed by Mayor

Cathy Green and eventually overturned.

Beyond the readiness of the technologies, both are very similar.

Verizon’s five megabits per second service will run about $40 a

month; Time Warner will charge $44.95 a la carte, and $39.95 a month

when bundled with cable.

Verizon also plans to offer a blazing-fast 15 megabits per second

service for $49.95 a month, and 30 megabits per second service at

$199 a month for businesses. Time Warner plans to offer a wireless

six-megabits-per-second service aimed at video game players for

$64.95.

Both companies are using Huntington Beach to test the technology

for future markets, although Time Warner’s customer base for the

service is limited to parts of Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Verizon plans to eventually offer the service nationwide.