Portland Trailblazers

On Monday, chipmaker Intel released a survey ranking the 100 “most unwired” cities in the U.S. Somewhat surprisingly, the top spot belonged not to New York City, San Francisco or Seattle, but the Portland/Vancouver area.

By sheer coincidence, the following day I was scheduled to interview Martin Peck, the Portland resident whose wireless user group, the Janus Wireless Project, masterminded the recent Wi-Fi Caravan, a 14-hour road trip to the San Francisco Bay that successfully proved an 802.11 wireless network could be established and maintained by a convoy of moving vehicles. (More on the Wi-Fi Caravan in the April issue of Wireless Review’s print edition.)

Peck is not the first Portland-based wireless innovator we’ve covered--in January, Vince Vittore profiled Adam Shand, the founder of the local wireless users group PersonalTelcoProject, which operates 80 free Wi-Fi hot spots throughout the city in addition to maintaining a retired 1986 Ford Econoline 350 television news van retrofitted to serve as a mobile repeater node. So in light of Intel’s survey, I asked Peck just what it is that makes Portland such a hot spot for hot spots.

“It’s an interesting environment,” he said. “It’s a more well-to-do area of the nation, and there are a lot of technology companies and technically-capable people based here.” (Portland is home to divisions of firms including Hewlett-Packard, Xerox and…well, Intel.)

More importantly, Peck said the city also boasts a solid reliance on the communal spirit that has spurred the growth of grassroots wireless freenets across the country. “There is a density of people who find value in and care about communities and services,” he said, citing the growth of free wireless access points in and around the city’s downtown business district as evidence. In fact, Portland has 130 public wireless access points, more locations per capita than any other U.S. city. There are another 88 hot spots in hotels, coffee shops and the airport. “People here augment business with community,” Peck said.

And that’s a lesson worth considering for anyone with a vested interest in helping wireless grow: Striving for synergy between people and profits ultimately benefits both halves of the equation. Guys like Peck and Shand not only understand the value and potential of wireless, but they’ve made it their mission to spread the gospel throughout their corner of the world. Local businesses have gotten the message, and citizens have responded in kind. Now Portland is the most unwired city in the U.S. Wireless service providers and manufacturers would be wise to consider the reasons why--and apply those lessons throughout the rest of the country.