DUMBO The First NYC Neighborhood To Get Wi-Fi

In twenty years when all internet is wireless and fast and ubiquitous, we might laugh at the notion that the subways had absolutely no connection, nor did any other part of New York's public space, for that matter.

But not so for DUMBO, who seems to be the first neighborhood ready to leap into that future, as NYCwireless announced today that the Brooklyn neighborhood is going wireless. While many hotspots have sprung up throughout the city, never before has an entire area been blanketed with service, a press release from the DUMBO Business Improvement District noted.

Wi-fi will be available in the streets and parks in the area, including the newly done-up Brooklyn Bridge Park.

One person who is thrilled about this news? Brooklyn's beloved and nebbishy president Marty Markowitz. "For the first time in New York City, an entire area has become a hot spot - a haven for bloggers, Tweeters, emailers, Facebookers and everyone else who thrives on the internet," he said. "One day, mark my words, this area will rival Silicon Valley in terms of high tech ingenuity - so it's only natural that DUMBO is the first neighborhood to be truly connected 24/7."

The real estate company Two Trees Management, which owns most of DUMBO, is teaming up the DUMBO BID to make it a reality.

The New York Times reports that Manhattan may soon be getting a wireless network of its own, sort of:

At the end of June, one company, Towerstream, plans to introduce what it claims will be "the most robust and fastest portable Wi-Fi network" in Manhattan, though it will not technically be free: it hopes to sell access to cellphone service providers, who could then offer it to their customers. Wi-Fi generally provides a faster and stronger signal than cellphone networks.

Comments

[cassalee]

11:01 PM on 07/07/2011

Just wanted to share my personal experience with this. I work in Dumbo. On an occasional lunch break, I pull out my phone and hop on the internet for a few minutes, and have been doing so for months. When I did that last week, I was connected automatically to the "FREE DUMBO" wifi. You have to sign up/create a login ID and password. So I did. Apparently there is also a verification email sent to the email address you entered to use the network, which you have to follow the link to confirm. Which I didn't--I didn't see that. It's also not in my inbox. The '240 minutes' I was given to complete the task had expired, so now I am locked out with no obvious recourse. No longer can I hop on the internet on my phone in Dumbo, thanks to this. Kind of ironic.

[Ernie Evil]

10:31 AM on 06/05/2011

Republicans always complain about the possibility of corruption on investment for social development. But they don't realize that the "corruption" is almost always link to the methods of unfettered capitalism that they most cherish.

[MVPost]

09:55 PM on 06/04/2011

Sounds great! Way to go Dumbo.

[melponeme k]

07:59 PM on 06/04/2011

This is a waste of money. And it is rewarding an already rich neighborhood which doesn't need the infrastructure. I for one don't want my tax money to be paying for this when it could be benefiting schools. Or it could be supporting public pools which are being closed down in many poorer neighborhoods.

I'm counting the minutes before these hotspots will be turned off due to bandwidth hogs and freeloaders.

[rjhuntington]

06:28 AM on 06/04/2011

The article is about DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Underpass) but the HuffPo photo illustrating the article is a stock photo of the Brooklyn Bridge.

[Whitney Snyder]

08:29 PM on 06/04/2011

dumbo is located between the brooklyn and manhattan bridges, so no problem here

[Nobrun]

05:42 AM on 06/04/2011

Front page headline: how about changing it to 'Neighborhood First To Go Wi-Fi In NYC' because "NYC Neighborhood (Is Not) First To Go Wi-Fi".

[CubanVoice]

05:19 PM on 06/04/2011

Should be "First NYC Neighborhood to go Wi-Fi"

[Frippertronic]

06:25 PM on 06/04/2011

How about -

"Wi NYC Wireless First Neighborhood ToFi Go In"?

[gokulram arunasalam]

03:56 PM on 06/03/2011

This is certainly very impressive! Was in Barcelona recently and amazed how convenient it was that the subway had wifi too. Hoping New York will get something similar.

[Downwthat]

11:54 AM on 06/03/2011

Waste of time and last ditch effort to thwart truly free wifi. Just look at the Repubs being lobbied successfully to outlaw free private wifi networks.

http://www.wiredtowns.com/?p=1060
http://pcworld.about.net/news/Jun272005id121597.htm
This shows the intent, to not let private citizens create a communally supported free network is a grotesque expansion of government authority and a volgur intrusion into our private lives. With the newly freed/released/deregulated low frequency bands released from tv and radio broadcasters (which are much lower than the possibly harmful cellular frequencies) we will have the ability to safely broadcast our own wireless signals for a few miles using what is essentially the same home routers that the majority of American households employ. Think of the ease at which we could cheaply blanket urban areas. The fight is called "net neutrality" so wake up because this is all related!

[skatscan]

04:07 AM on 06/03/2011

And New York finally catches up to other parts of the country that have been wireless for many years now.

[J Trent Morgan]

11:48 PM on 06/02/2011

In what way is Marty Markowitz "nebbishy"? And how is calling him that germane to an article about wifi installation?

[bagelmart]

11:41 PM on 06/02/2011

A Dumbo Idea

[MIKEinNYC]

11:25 PM on 06/02/2011

I hate to be a spoil-sport but has the impact on health been looked into?

Just today somewhere online I read that the Worlds Health oganization, a credible organization, opined that cellphones are deleterious to your health.

http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/01/remedies-for-cellphone-cancer-concerns/?scp=2

[Doc Wattson]

04:16 PM on 06/03/2011

Cell Phones might cause health problems, not the signal. If that was the case the spread of FM and AM would of giving this country cancer.

[HekmagaJuximaxx]

09:33 PM on 06/03/2011

Actually, I have heard of no study of the effects of AM and FM transmissions, especially one over the span of several decades, as needed to be done. But even if they had proposed such a study, I doubt that they would have had the technology to even collect the data, let alone analyze it. It remains for future generations to determine if these transmissions, in addition to UHF and VHF, are responsible for anything at all.

[roydoe]

10:19 PM on 06/02/2011

Not free 'nuff said

[beninabox1]

11:52 PM on 06/02/2011

Yeah, that phrase "will not technically be free" is a joke. It's not free in *any* sense.

[J Trent Morgan]

11:53 PM on 06/02/2011

Uh ... it's the one in Manhattan that's not free. The one in Brooklyn is. Just readin the article.

[reading2009]

12:30 PM on 06/03/2011

Favorited for your reading comprehension.

[Ano333]

09:22 PM on 06/03/2011

Uh, the one in DUMBO isn't free, it's funded through the district improvement organization, which is funded through levies that act like property taxes. Just because the end user doesn't pay, doesn't make it "free."

[BrooklynChef]

08:08 PM on 06/02/2011

There is so many people out there who don't lock their wifi, you can pretty much get it anywhere anyway.

[americanalien]

08:39 PM on 06/02/2011

That's not true. I've never been that lucky to find a truly open private network.

[beninabox1]

11:53 PM on 06/02/2011

Where I am they're few and far between. Almost all are locked in Hoboken/JC area.

[cyoohoos]

06:22 PM on 06/02/2011

This is an absolute waste of taxpayer money. They tried this in Philly and it was riddled with corrupt contracts between *friends*, wrought with equipment failures and guess what...

Poor people who don't have PC's don't need wireless services. So the tax paying base wound up paying for the corrupt city contract AND their own reliable home service.

Fortunately when they mayor's office changed hands, this contract was cancelled.

[king friday]

06:43 PM on 06/02/2011

you can still see the "wireless philly" SSID in some neighborhoods..

[Gerard Plourde]

06:59 PM on 06/02/2011

The city owns the infrastructure. It was converted to a network for City business only.

[edgeninja]

01:51 AM on 06/03/2011

So investing in the future is a "waste of taxpayer money" now?

[skatscan]

04:09 AM on 06/03/2011

To a right winger it always is, Imagine if they were this dominant in the 50s. We'd have hardly any decent highways and the ones we have would have massive tolls going into the pockets of the very few.

[cyoohoos]

04:34 AM on 06/03/2011

Did you even read my post? Are you aware that Democrats can be just as corrupt as Republicans when it comes to sweetheart contracts and campaign kickbacks? Don't be fooled that this is an *investment*. You want an investment, go for something that DOESN'T require and expensive gadget to take advantage of, like a bike lane