Swall gets Verizon broadband

On Aug. 23, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) voted to approve a $286,398 grant to Verizon California Inc. to bring high speed internet broadband to the unserved and underserved communities of Swall Meadows and Crowley Lake.

The grant will cover about 34% of the project cost. Download speeds of 3 megabits to 10 megabits per second, and uploads of at least 1 megabit per second, will be available to Verizon landline customers for $39 per month with a 1 year service commitment. There will also be a one-time fee of $75 for a modem and service activation. (Non-landline customers can also obtain standalone broadband service, at a higher cost.)

Verizon will make service available to those communities no later than Jan. 28, 2013. Verizon applied for the California Advanced Services Fund grant after reluctantly agreeing to provide service to Swall Meadows and Crowley Lake as partial mitigation for violating the California State Scenic Highway Under-grounding law.

Verizon had strung ariel fiber optic cable along U.S. 395 between Crowley Lake and Mammoth Lakes beginning in 2001, without seeking to obtain the required permit to deviate from the under-grounding requirement.

The new high-speed broadband service will utilize existing copper phone lines to residences, which will be connected through new nodes to Verizon’s existing fiber optic cable running between Bishop and Mammoth Lakes.

Verizon has assured the CPUC that upgrades of its existing fiber optic cable line between Mammoth Lakes and Victorville will be completed by early November, making the promised service speeds attainable. –Press Release