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Affiliates Four Rivers Development, Inc. (FORDI) Debra Peters – General Manager North Central Kansas Community Network NCKCN is a wireless network stretching from southern Nebraska to Salina and beyond. It is one of the earliest examples of how a wireless network can connect communities without the need for cable or fiber. Broadband wireless access is now available in Beloit, Concordia, Clay Center, Salina, Lincoln, Minneapolis, Ada, Republic, Solomon, Clifton, Clyde, Glasco, Delphos, Scottsville, Mankato and now Belleville. NCKCN provides broadband wireless access with several speed options. This service is always on and can provide any location high-speed broadband access without the high cost of land-lines from telephone companies. The configurations are based on unrestricted line-of-sight to the receiver tower within the normal operating range. This is an example of a regional project with the slogan, "The Internet Solution for the Rural Community," and a goal "to bring a true sense of community to all residents of a region known only by a generic name, North Central Kansas." History and Future Goals In 1995, the NCRPC created a regional Internet Service Provider (ISP) to confront the digital divide and the growing competitive disadvantage presented by the absence of affordable Internet access for area businesses and educational institutions. This action was taken only after multiple conversations with area service providers revealed no immediate future plans on their part to do the same. Known as the North Central Kansas Community Network Co., a 501(c)3 corporation, the effort established a single Wide Area Network (WAN) that aggregated area-wide demand for Internet service and thereby introduced cost efficiencies associated with economies of scale. The initiative won the 1998 HUD John J. Gunther "Best Practices" Award for the Kansas Department of Commerce and Housing, which partially funded the effort, and a 1999 Computerworld-Smithsonian Medal for the NCRPC in the government category for innovative use of technology. Operating from that foundation, the NCRPC has since initiated development of a regional wireless network with funding assistance from both the Economic Development Administration and the Kansas Department of Commerce and Housing. Partial service at speeds between 256 Kbps to 1.0 Mbps is currently available in eight of 11 participating counties. Once fully deployed and operational, this effort will create an upgradeable 5.8 GHz, 10 Mbps full-duplex backbone, whose initial goal is to provide broadband Internet access to locations not otherwise on the high-speed grid being planned by major service providers. It promises the added benefit of linking all county seat cities and many secondary communities in the region under one umbrella such that educational and business resources can be more easily shared. This will then make possible the region's dream of forming a truly functional "incubator without walls" that assembles and delivers en situ many of the human support needs prospective or struggling rural entrepreneurs require to achieve their goals. The NCRPC has also developed a working alliance with Cunningham Telephone and Cable Company, a local independent service provider, selling that company wholesale access to the Internet. Cunningham not only offers dial-up access via its telephone system, but also broadband, full-duplex Internet service through its modern cable system. That system is directly connected to the NCRPC wireless network, further extending broadband service possibilities to very small communities of North Central Kansas not otherwise directly served by NCKCN. Rural Oasis is meant to provide both information and hands-on assistance which not only fills the gaps in human knowledge about what it means to be rural, but also those in one's individual ability to exist as rural. Too often similar sites presume to educate people by providing them information, overlooking the fact that people respond differently to information, with many needing another person's help even though the information is there for them to see. This site is to take the next step and set up an electronic environment, making it possible for neighbor to help neighbor. Rural Oasis is also to be one point of entry into an "incubator without walls," a place where businesses - or those seeking to initiate a business - can go to find the assistance they need without first being required to relocate their operation. Here, they are to find solutions to their:
In North Central Kansas, we can offer high speed, broadband connectivity to many points within the region, enabling an entrepreneur to connect to sources of assistance that might not otherwise be available. We also have communities interested in setting up buildings to provide space if needed, which too can be brought online if need be. [Learn More] Eye-on-Kansas describes the People, Places and Things one encounters while touring rural Kansas. Featured articles are written by rural residents, exposing the reader to the expertise and rich variety found in even the most rural part of the state. The objective of "Eye" is to eliminate the mindset that rural Kansas is a poor second choice to a more urban setting by describing the many opportunities and treasures people have found. OnLine Journal of Rural Research & Policy (OJRRP) OJRRP is a joint venture of Kansas State University and the North Central Regional Planning Commission. Its mission is to attract academic research written from and focused on the rural experience, offering a perspective not otherwise presented in comparable journals. The information thus accumulated can be used to better formulate policy and programs impacting rural places.
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Updated
7/18/08
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