ComputerWorld mentions that Taipei is planning a citywide Wi-Fi network next year. And this is no small project either. They plan to blanket the city with between 15,000 and 20,000 access points, at a total cost of $70 million. I only wonder if they took a hard look at mesh networking to get the costs down, because they appear awfully steep.

Nevertheless, it seems that not a week goes by without another city investing in or studying a metro-wide Wi-Fi network.

Off the top of my head, here are a few cities to keep an eye on:

• New York City
  
• Philadelphia
  
• Atlanta
  
• New Orleans
  
• San Francisco
  
• Los Angeles
  

And I could quickly generate a list of 50+ smaller and rural metro areas that are also pursuing Wi-Fi networks. So why the big rush to Wi-Fi? And why should carriers be concerned?

Here are a few reasons why:

1. The digital divide: Internet access is no longer a luxury, it is a necessity. Cities want to provide Internet access to all of their residents. It is a noble and necessary pursuit and must not be trivialized.
   
2. The Wi-Fi effect: A funny thing happens when people install their first wireless home networks. They become a good deal more savvy about wireless technology. Suddenly, they're in charge of a network and it's not such a big deal after all. It's a minor, but important, shift in thinking that I believe will increasingly challenge the carriers. Metro wireless networking is little more than home networking on a larger scale. Town managers look at all the things they could do with a wireless network that they control. They could provide their emergency personnel with broadband connections, they could install video cameras around town with wireless feeds, they could track assets around town with wireless transponders, they could share one backhaul connection between multiple city buildings, dramatically cutting costs.
   
3. Carrier arrogance and/or apathy: Carriers have been sticking it to cities for years, charging them unnecessarily high rates for emergency services, backhaul, etc., not to mention underserving parts of the cities that carriers view as low margin. It is only to be expected that cities want to take matters into their own hands to save money primarily and at the least keep the carriers honest. If carriers had been more aggressive, more innovate and more affordable over the years we would not be witnessing this municipal backlash. Cities don't want to get into the telecoms business, but if they can save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year (or millions), while providing better service to their staff and citizens, they're going to give it a hard look.
   
4. Buzz: Cities are well aware of the attention they'll recieve by offering metro Wi-Fi networks. Cities want attention these days, to attract new businesses and residents. I'm not sure a city like New York or Los Angeles needs much more buzz, but this type of thinking makes great sense in smaller cities, those who want to attract people and business from the larger metro areas. Richard Florida (author of The Rise of the Creative Class believes this much. Internet access provides a cultural and business lifeline to people in smaller cities and rural areas.
   

That said, I understand that there are more than 10 states that prohibit municipalities from providing telecoms services. I also understand that the major telcos and cablecos are in a lobbying frenzy to prevent this as well.

Ultimately, they will fail. They will fail because the Wi-Fi cat is out of the bag and there's no putting him back in again. We, as increasingly savvy wireless consumers, now know what we can do with wireless networks if we own them. Wireless is a local phenomenon. We control Wi-Fi in our homes and municipalities are going to control Wi-Fi (and WiMAX) within their city lines.

Want to know more about municipal wireless developments? I highly recommend checking out this Web site.