Flathead doesn't apply for Google speed test

In high school, some lucky students get the opportunity to test out of things — classes, finals, the like — simply because they’re already up to speed on the material.

It’s kind of like that here in the Flathead when it comes to testing ultra-high-speed Internet connections.

In February, Google announced an initiative to test rural sites for these amped-up Web connections. The California-based cyber giant issued a call to rural residents across the country to nominate their towns and small cities for the experiment, which would test fiber-to-the-home connections at speeds of one gigabit per second.

With all but four cities in Montana recognized as rural by the federal government, it seems the perfect place to field the test. Missoula Mayor John Engen announced his support for the project earlier this month, urging his constituents to back the city’s case. Missoula filed its official application last week.

The deadline for entries was Friday, and according to a Montana West Economic Development press release, the Flathead Valley never turned one in.

“What many of our residents may not be aware of is that we already take advantage of advanced services through CenturyLink’s robust fiber network,” Kellie Danielson said in a news release. Danielson is Montana West president and chief executive officer of the Flathead County Economic Development Authority.

“Recently, the FCC released the National Broadband Plan, with the long-term goal of having one-gigabit service to anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals and military installations in each community over the next decade. We have exceeded that goal, and have had speeds of one gigabit per second or more in the Flathead Valley for almost five years,” Jeremy Ferkin, CenturyLink vice president and general manager of the company’s Rocky Mountain market, stated in the release.

There are 600 miles of fiber optics currently connected in the Flathead Valley.

The state-of-the-art system cost more than $170 million to install and reaches more than 4,000 homes, Ferkin said.

And it isn’t just CenturyLink offering super high speeds and integrating fiber networks.

Fred Weber, founder of MontanaSky.net, said technology exists here in the Flathead to reach 10-gigabit speeds — far exceeding the speed of the Google test.

Communities that receive the Google test grant have the gift of getting a free network that usually costs $12 to $14 a foot to install. The cost has impeded smaller companies such as Montana Sky from retrofitting all areas of the valley with the state-of-the-art systems, Weber said.

“The providers here have the technical ability but not the deep pockets of Google,” he said.

Even so, he said the technology already in place is adequate to meet the needs of the majority of residents and business owners.

“Our network is three times faster than any other network in the area,” Weber said.

As Ferkin put it: “More than 94 percent of the homes in the Flathead Valley have high-speed Internet available to them, and almost 70 percent of those homes can currently purchase speeds up to 10 Mbps, making the Flathead Valley one of the most connected, highest speed-available communities in the nation,” Ferkin said.