Vacant Office Buildings Getting Free Gigabit Fiber

Well, well, well... when it rains it pours. Last week I happily posted about Google's consideration of San Jose (and other Silicon Valley cities) to be part of the next Google Fiber expansion. This would bring inexpensive ultra-fast internet to homes, businesses, and schools. Now it looks like the City of San Jose is initiating a new program that would use Fiber as a carrot to help fill vacant office buildings.

The City currently has some excess capacity in their internal Gigabit Fiber network. The Office of Economic Development is proposing that we use that extra capacity to wire up to six buildings with over 30% vacancy as an incentive for companies to fill those spaces. The ultra-fast internet would come free of charge, but the building owners would have to pay for any up-front costs to connect the building to the Fiber.  The out of pocket costs to San Jose would be nil, but the upside could be more companies in San Jose and increased tax revenue.

So far three building owners are interested: 2 North First, 4 North Second, and 75 E. Santa Clara.

Source: SVBJ