Shannon Fiecke of the Shakopee Valley News reports:

Lightning-fast Internet could be possible for area homes and businesses if locals can convince Google to make Scott County a testing ground for high-speed fiber.

Google is looking for one or more communities across America to become trial sites for its ultra-high-speed broadband network.

With a fiber-to-home connection, Google’s networks would deliver Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most people have access to today – faster than 1-gigabit per second.

“Imagine sitting in a rural health clinic, streaming three-dimensional medical imaging over the Web, and discussing a unique condition with a specialist in New York. Or downloading a high-definition, full-length feature film in less than five minutes,” said a Google promotional ad. “Universal, ultra-high-speed Internet access will make all this and more possible.”

Scott County has experience in high-speed fiber, having hooked its buildings, cities, and schools to a 90-mile optic ring that allows fast data-sharing among local jurisdictions and the state.

“I think we’re uniquely positioned,” said Scott County Administrator Gary Shelton, with the right demographics, close proximity to major universities, knowledgeable work force, and communities with a history of working together.

Indeed, the fiber ring, constructed in partnership with Access Communications, has been a prize project of the Scott County Association for Leadership and Efficiency (SCALE), a local intergovernmental organization.

Shelton, an early leader in the project, said he believes the Google proposal would be another good task for SCALE. City administrators were to meet Tuesday afternoon to talk about applying to Google, he said.

A couple technology geeks from Shakopee are already lobbying to make their city and surrounding townships a Google community.
Computer programmer Brian Krebs and coworker Bradley Johnson, a software salesman for Chanhassen-based KorTerra, started a Facebook group promoting Shakopee as possible test site.

The pair went before their city’s Telecommunications Advisory Commission last week to encourage Shakopeee to submit a proposal.

The idea will go to the Shakopee City Council.

“With recent investments in fiber-optic networks in neighboring counties, Scott County and Shakopee can show that a public private partnership can deliver the needed services for our community,” the pair wrote. “Local, high tech businesses like Seagate, Q-Logic, and Open Systems as well as printing companies like RR Donnelly and Imagine Printing have high bandwidth needs. Our regional hospital will directly benefit from being attached to an ultra high-speed connection. St. Francis serves a largely rural and suburban population in Scott and neighboring rural counties.”

Google said it wants to experiment with new ways to make Internet access better and faster for everyone. It plans to offer the trial service at a “competitive price” to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people. It intends to share its network with other service providers to give consumers choices.

“Network providers are making real progress to expand and improve high-speed Internet access, but there's still more to be done,” the company said.

Google has put out a request for information in order to identify interested communities. It welcomes responses from local governments, as well as members of the public.

With a March 26 deadline, Google has made the application window purposely short, Shelton said.

“They’re not looking to stretch it out,” he said. “They’ll get thousands of applications.”

Shannon Fiecke is a staff writer for the Shakopee Valley News. She can be reached at sfiecke@swpub.com.