CenturyLink had been planning for gigabit speeds in...

earlier this year that it would bring the fiber to parts of Omaha. “We think Omaha is replicable,” he said, conditioning his statement on how what he calls the “trial” goes and how receptive municipalities are. “We can do that again. … Future deployments are going to hinge on [community support] for us.” CenturyLink “agonized internally” over how much it wanted or did not want from Omaha, and worried about a potential “tsunami” of expectations when or if CenturyLink would bring a gigabit to other territories, he added. The telco should publicize its Omaha work and engage with the community more, said Gig.U Executive Director Blair Levin on the same panel. It’s “great to see an incumbent player do that,” he said of CenturyLink, praising the potential of such networks. Municipalities should take a “progressive posture” on acquiring fast networks, said Fiber to the Home Council Americas President Heather Gold. Jones stressed the sustainability challenges for incumbents, which new entrants like Google Fiber and the municipal network of Longmont, Colo., may not face: “If they have no obligation to stay there, how long will they stay there if things go bad?” Google Associate Corporate Counsel Megan Anne Stull stressed that her company sees this as a business and is in it for the long haul. Vince Jordan, broadband services manager for Longmont Power & Communications, said his municipal network is going before city leaders Tuesday to push for an even broader rollout of its fast network throughout the city. He wants to pass every home and business there, he said. He compared the discussions to those surrounding electrification a hundred years ago, pointed out that the Longmont utility is in its 101st year and plans to stay involved in broadband “for at least another hundred years” and reassess then.