What is the Community Broadband Network (CBN)?
The CBN is a 1gb connection out to the net and provides bandwidth for a range of communities and groups in San Francisco. It has been created through partnerships between City government non-profits and technology consultants. The network’s primary partners are the San Francisco Department of Technology, The Internet Archives[Ralf Muehlen] and Internet pioneers Tim Pozar and Matt Peterson.
Who uses the network?
The network provides Internet access for low income housing sites, community groups and an Island 50 km off the coast of San Francisco.
Will this network cover the entire City?
NO! There are no plans to build a city wide network. This project is focused on expanding Internet access with minimal expense to the City.
Are there plans to grow this network and can I get free Internet too?
We are working on a model that will allow communities to use the CBN as their Internet backbone. Groups can use the donated bandwidth to build neighborhood wifi networks. If you would like to get involved please fill out this form. We are going to be testing our deployment model at a few sites in September and October.
Does the network work and can you promise that I will always be able to get online?
Yes and No. Through Tim Pozar, Ralf Muelhens and Matt Peterson’s leadership the CBN is reliable and stable. We have 20 core switches that are connected to a unique pair of City fiber. The fiber connects to the Internet via the Internet Archive (thanks Brewster). Some of these switches will have wireless bridges connected. These “roots bridges” will connect remote bridges to the Internet. The CBN NOC will support the switches and the root bridges. There will no support for any remote bridges. This website will share info about the status of these devices. If the root bridges are working [link]and you cannot get online please contact the support person for the remote bridges
Why won’t the CBN help me if I can’t get online?
In order for this network to grow the “community” needs to support any expansion. The CBN NOC is a small team of volunteers who are not able to help end users. For end user support please post questions here.
Hi, I’m at the Valencia Gardens on the Guerrero St. side and I’ve not had internet for over a week. I posted here a while back about a sluggish/unstable connection – it was stable and worked well until a couple of days prior to Thanksgiving week. It just completely stopped, on one of those days I would randomly get like 20 mins of internet, then it just drops and still ongoing.
I had asked someone in the VGA office and he said there was an issue with the equipment. Is this where the community support comes in and fix, or is it one of the larger issues you guys are working on?
Also, I was hoping to volunteer and join you guys to learn more about the project. How much time would I need to commit/or which days?
Hi,
it’s me gary again. Just to tell you Valencia Gardens is up and running and all static routes have be reverted back to dynamic, and have been tested and it is working.