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Free WIFI hits the Beach

Monday 25 February 2013, 6:25PM

By Tararua District Council

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Akitio Beach residents can now access fast wireless internet services being provided by Inspire Net.

Additionally at Akitio Beach, there are two areas around the boat club and community centre that allow free wifi of 100 megabytes, per month, per device, for visitors and locals alike to check their email at the beach. The Akitio School has also been connected to a high-speed wireless connection under the Government’s Rural Broadband Initiative.

This has been made possible by the Inspire Net and Tararua District Council’s inter-town fibre project with a “wireless shot” from the fibre at the Council building in Dannevirke and the support of a few farmers to get over the hills. It is also possible for Inspire Net to build more towers to service more of the rural areas in the Tararua. However, to succeed, this usually requires a local “champion” farmer to rally support from their surrounding neighbours.

Inspire Net Managing Director, James Watts said, “We would like to focus on increasing the wireless services in the Tararua this year. There are many farms that will find our wireless service vastly better than their current internet services and it can be a lot cheaper than the other options. All they need to do is give us a call to see what is possible in their area.”

Most wireless systems need ‘line of sight’ with trees and hills often preventing individual properties from ‘seeing’ the internet feed. The Inspire Net service provides a dedicated five megabit per second download speed. This is the minimum household speed the Government is targeting to roll out over the next nine years for urban fibre broadband services.

If you have any enquiries regarding please contact Peter Wimsett, Manager Strategy and District Development on 06 374 4080.