Preston to become the Paris of the North?

Lancashire's newest city has unveiled ambitious plans to expand its Wi-Fi network from its busy campus

Preston in Lancashire is to create a city-wide Wi-Fi network that will allow its 200,000 residents to experience the benefits of high-speed wireless Internet connections via PCs and PDAs.

Paris currently boasts the largest scale Wi-Fi network in Europe, according to network operators SFR, with high-speed connections available over the kilometre between the Bridge of Neuilly and the Grande Arch

The Preston scheme, which will blanket most of the city in Wi-Fi signals broadcast by 802.11b routers, is a partnership between TeleGeneration, Preston City Council and the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN), after a recent small-scale trial at the university proved hugely popular.

The university trial offered students free Wi-Fi access. Now TeleGeneration, the technology provider of the network equipment, will charge £60 a year to provide residents with access to the network, which has been extended outside the city centre with an additional 100 wireless hotspots. Access to students will remain free.

"We want to give blanket coverage to even the disadvantaged areas of the city," said Andrew Birchall, project manager at TeleGeneration.

The network runs at 512kbps, and can provide data rates as high as 2Mbps at peak periods. Telegeneration will provide technical support for the network via its Web site, as well as a full-time technician based at the University. The network's main servers are maintained by Manchester Computing, and the network uses wireless gateways from Bluesocket. (ZDNet UK)