Westminster wants to go wireless.
“It?s the kind of thing to let people know that Westminster, with all of its small-town charm, is still a contemporary community that wants to have professionals live and work downtown,” City Council Member Gregory Pecoraro said.
The Carroll Cable Regulatory Commission awarded the city a $15,000 grant for a feasibility study that will determine how Westminster can become a hot spot, allowing any resident or merchant with a laptop, cell phone or personal digital assistant to jump on the Internet without the limitation of wires or the inconvenience of dial-up connections.
Westminster would join a handful of cities in the region that have gone wireless, including Annapolis and Frederick.
Sykesville launched a small hot spot as a pilot project, and Baltimore City announced this year that it too wanted to offer wireless Internet access.
Westminster officials and technology experts touted cities with free wireless connections as a way to let residents work from home and attract new businesses while helping existing ones grow.
“If you can give businesses enough bandwidth, they are going to grow,” said Hugh Bethell, general manager of Port Networks, a wireless Internet service provider in Baltimore City.
Broadband Internet access still isn?t available in certain sections of Westminster, where some residents and businesses are forced to use the comparatively slow connection of dial-up.
The study will determine if an Internet service provider would sell advertising to allow residents to surf cyberspace for free or if users would be charged a fee, said Council Member Robert Wack, who serves as the cable commission?s vice chairman.
“This is certainly the wave of the future and something worth exploring,” Council President Roy Chiavacci said.
