With the proliferation of smart phones such as the Apple iPhones, Google’s Android phones, HTC and many other such mobile computing devices that double as telephones, getting a strong, high-speed internet connection on the go has become more important than ever. There is nothing more frustrating than being stuck on a laggy AT&T 3G network when you need to pull up information quickly.
Where possible, WiFi is almost always the better, faster, more reliable service. But where and how to find out can be a mystery for some users. Talk of the Sound would like to help solve some of the mystery by building a WiFi map for New Rochelle but we are going to need some help from readers to develop the City’s WiFi map.
Talk of the Sound hopes to use this article to introduce a crowd-sourcing effort to map WiFi hotspots in New Rochelle — public and quasi-public (not unsecured private hotspots). We are putting up an initial map which makers Optimum WiFi hotspots and the BID’s downtown WiFi network and hope readers will post comments or send emails with additional information. From time to time we will update the map and publish it with all of the updated we get from readers.
Thanks to Cablevision’s Optimum WiFi service, New Rochelle is now blanketed with WiFi hotspots that are accessible to the many New Rochelle residents who are Cablevision customers. To get the ball rolling we have put together a map of New Rochelle indicating the most recent listing of Optimum WiFi hotspots.
Cablevision is making it even easier to use their service with their recently announced “Automatic Sign In” which allows users to sign in to Optimum WiFi just once. After that their WiFi-enabled device will automatically connect to the network at any of the thousands of locations where Optimum WiFi is available in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
Cablevision extended their reach throughout the New York metro area through roaming agreements with Time-Warner Road Runner and Comcast Xfinity Wifi. Cablevision customers who are in range of a WiFi hotspot from Time-Warner or Comcast and have already used the “Automatic Sign In” will automatically be logged in to these hotspots as well (mostly in Queens, Manhattan and New Jersey). Cablevision has, by far, the most WiFi hotspots in the region. Optimum WiFi is broadly available in outdoor locations like downtown areas, parks and other high-traffic and commercial destinations including almost all Metro North stations in the area.
You can learn how to connect your laptop and how to connect your mobile device on the Cablevision web site. Even better, you can enable specific WiFi-enabled devices like a Nintendo DS, an Eye-Fi memory card for cameras and video recorders and more.
New Rochelle was the first major downtown in Westchester and in the southern Hudson Valley region to be equipped with a free outdoor WiFi Network. The network initiative was undertaken by the New Rochelle Downtown Business Improvement District (BID).
The BID’s Downtown WiFi network covers a far smaller but far denser area in downtown New Rochelle including the New Rochelle Intermodal Transport Facility (otherwise known as the New Rochelle train station), the Public Library and many restaurants, bars, coffees shops, public areas in the downtown area.
The BID Downtown WiFi Network provides free outdoor wireless Internet access in an area encompassing twenty blocks in New Rochelle’s central business district. According to the BID web site, coverage is generally available in the area of Main and Huguenot Streets between LeCount Place and Centre Street as well as at Library Green and the Metro-North Railroad Station, which also has been equipped by the BID with the railroad’s first public information computer kiosk. Indoor coverage will vary depending on your proximity to WiFi access points.
The BID network has been operational since 2006 and is one of the first and longest operating east coast wide-area municipal mesh Wi-Fi networks. The system was designed and deployed for the BID by Wireless EDGE, a New Rochelle based wireless deployment company.
