Hydro utilities will introduce it in 2007

Plans are underway to blanket most of the area with wireless internet coverage, which would allow people to roam from Waterloo to Cambridge without losing Internet access.

Atria Networks Inc., a joint venture of four local hydro utilities, plans to roll out wireless internet, or wi-fi, to Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, Guelph and 14 other communities in Waterloo Region and southern Wellington County by the end of 2007, said Steven McCartney, Atria's chief executive officer.

The company is seeking government approvals to install transmission devices on traffic-signal and utility poles.

On March 22, Waterloo regional council approvals an agreement under which Atria will pay the region $24.60 per traffic-signal pole.

If Atria receives all necessary approvals, the rollout will begin in June, McCartney said.

Atria has offered wireless access in uptown Waterloo since October and has also set up wi-fi "hot spots" in several area libraries, businesses and community centers.

But the company's new plans would surpass any existing wi-fi rollout in Canada.

"We think this becomes exponentially more useful if it becomes (available) almost everywhere," McCartney said..

The largest area now served with wi-fi in Canada is Fredericton, said Marc Choma, spokesperson for the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association. But much of Fredericton is not covered under that city's municipal wi-fi project.

In the United States, Tempe, Ariz., and Oklahoma City have city-wide wi-fi networks, while several other cities, including Chicago, Philadelphia and Washington, have such networks in the planning stage. Google Inc. is preparing a network for San Francisco.

Unlike Fredericton's city-owned network and Google's proposed advertising-supported one, Waterloo Region's wi-fi network would not be free.

"We don't believe it will be sustainable to develop a free service," McCartney told a Waterloo wi-fi conference yesterday.

Currently, users of the UpTown Waterloo hot spot pay $29.95 per month for 2,500 megabytes of data transfer.

Wi-fi is not intended to replace cable modems or digital-subscriber line broadband Internet, McCartney said.

The target customer for wi-fi is someone who needs to access the internet from different places, such as a home and a small business. Atria's network would allow the person to access the internet from both location without paying twice, McCartney said.

Wi-fi is now used mostly with laptop computers, but in the future, it may be used more with hand-held devices like Research In Motion Ltd's BlackBerry. People will be able to make phone calls by combining wi-fi and voice over Internet Protocol, or VOIP, technology.

Wi-fi is faster and cheaper than the cellular networks now used with most mobile-communications devices, McCartney said.