Verizon has announced a deal with the city of Pittsburgh to begin rolling out FiOS services to city residents by the end of this summer.
This gives the city its first wired competitor to incumbent cable provider Comcast, whose franchise renewal is due at the end of this year.
Verizon FiOS will charge residents $47 per month for 250 standard definition channels plus local high definition channels, and $11 more for several dozen HD channels and more than a dozen sports networks.
Some suburban Pittsburgh customers can already access FiOS broadband products, as the company has wired parts of Banksville, Beechview, Bloomfield, Brookline, Carrick, East Hills, East Liberty, Friendship, Garfield, Highland Park, Homewood, Larimer, Lincoln-Lemington, Morningside, Overbrook, Point Breeze, Regent Square, Stanton Heights and Swisshelm Park. Completing agreements to send video down the network to add a “cable TV” type service is expected to be a relatively simple process, according to Verizon officials.
[flv width=”428″ height=”240″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WTAE Pittsburgh FIOS Arrives in Pittsburgh 7-6-09.flv[/flv]
WTAE Pittsburgh Reports on Verizon Agreement with the City of Pittsburgh
City residents can expect to see service available within the next six years, or the company will be subjected to fines by city officials. But Verizon should have service available far earlier, starting with most of the North Side, some South Hills neighborhoods near suburbs, the business district downtown, and parts of Lawrenceville.
In return for a franchise agreement, Verizon will mimic Comcast’s agreement with the city, handing over 5% of gross revenue. Verizon has also agreed to install dedicated fiber optic service between some city public safety buildings, $700,000 to upgrade the city’s video equipment, in part for local government proceedings, and 52 cents from each customer will be designated towards providing the viewer with public, educational, and local government channels. A total of five channels will be reserved: two for government, one for public access, one for educational use, and a fifth reserved for the future.
More video on this story below.
[flv width=”320″ height=”240″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KDKA Pittsburgh – Verizon Pittsburgh FIOS TV 11-08-07.flv[/flv]
KDKA Pittsburgh Introduces Viewers to Verizon FiOS, Available in Limited Areas (November 8, 2007)
[flv width="320" height="240"]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KDKA Pittsburgh - Verizon to Wire Pittsburgh for FIOS 8-07-08.flv[/flv]
KDKA Pittsburgh Reports on Verizon's Initial Efforts to Wire the City Limits with Fiber Optics (August 7, 2008)
[flv width="320" height="240"]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KDKA Pittsburgh - Pittsburgh Signs Agreement With Verizon for FIOS 7-6-09.flv[/flv]
KDKA Pittsburgh Reports on City Officials Reaching Tentative Agreement With Verizon to Introduce TV Service to City Residents (July 6, 2009)
Living in Bethel Park, a Pittsburgh suburb outside the city limits, I was so happy when I heard this. Living outside the confines of the city, I have had FiOS internet and phone (DirecTV for Sunday Ticket though) for nearly 3 years now (first got it when Adelphia went under). I have heard so many friends complain about Comcast for so long, whether it be for service, quality or the incessant channel changing among tiers(they are doing AGAIN!). It is nice to know that they will have other choices now. If anyone from the Burgh is reading this, go for… Read more »
Hi Matthew… you have a lot of folks in Rochester, NY drooling over your new found freedom. We’re still stuck with Frontier here.
Has Comcast upped the cap to 300GB? If you can find that on their website or somewhere else, let me know. It’s news to me.
I don’t think you’ll have to sell too many people on FiOS. Everyone wants it.
Thanks for being here!
My bad, it is 250. For some reason I thought it was 300.
If we could only get this in Rochester NY.
I was considering starting to pester Frontier about at least coming up with VDSL 2 service in metro Rochester, which would deliver better speeds to consumers and at least make it a fair fight in this area. What’s annoying is no matter how much you want to be a Frontier customer, they always find a way to mess it up. I’m still keeping them for phone service, because I think a regular phone line sounds better than cell phone or VOIP service, and if cable goes out, I’ll still have phone service. I am still hoping there is someone at… Read more »
I know it is VOIP, but alot of the VOIP services include forwarding to another number if they cannot contact your device. I have vonage and it does that. I forward it to my cellphone.
So at least part of that is fixed at this point.
Yes I know, and I have my Verizon cell phone and five prepaid phones (companies sent to me during a consumer review I wrote a year or so ago) so I’m set for virtually anything, but my first preference is still to my regular wired phone line. Maybe I’m old. 🙂 No, I’m not. I am still sitting on Virgin Mobile’s website grabbing free minutes from Sugar Mama, so I’m not too old. But wait, I did offer to give at least half of them back if they agreed to stop showing me James Blunt “ads.” Oh well, Sugar Mama… Read more »
I never saw a need for VOIP. I was a beta tester if you can call it that… for $9.95 a month for local calling I thought it was nice given that after NY raised the price of a second copper line with more fees and BS it was worth it but not $39.95 they can keep it. They slipped me a new modem with the ability of VOIP then kept pestering me when I was going to switch. I told them when the price became $9.95 again for local calling. That did not go over so well with them… Read more »
I pay $24.99 a month for unlimited nationwide calling. That is $15 less than RR and almost $50 less than Frontier.
Seems worth it to me. The cheapest phone bill that I have.
AS for the iphone, it is unlimited data so it may be worth it depending on what you do.
My phone costs plummeted about 5 years ago when my office gave me a cellphone with unlimited minutes and I dropped POTS from Frontier. I now rely on my trusty TMobile Blackberry with UMA (universal mobile access) to stay connected. UMA is truly awesome for those of us who travel internationally; anywhere in the world where I have a WI-Fi connection my Blackberry functions as though I was sitting at home without roaming charges. It is also smart enough to automatically switch between cell and UMA service whenever I come into range of a Wi-Fi connection (without dropping the call).