Spencer Municipal Utilities Expanding FTTH Construction

SPENCER, IA — Spencer Municipal Utilities, which provides cable, Internet, telephone and iWireless cellular service, is continuing to expand fiber to the home communication services throughout Spencer. A project that was announced last year is being finished up that will serve approximately 700 customers and work will begin early this fall on an approximate $4.5 million project for nearly 2,000 additional homes and businesses in Spencer.

“Just like Internet service has evolved from dial up to digital service lines (DSL) and cable modem, fiber will give customers the next level of service to continue to improve the way they live, work and play and we are continuing to build out this service throughout the community of Spencer,” says Amanda Gloyd, marketing & community relations manager.

Fiber Replaces Existing Copper Infrastructure
This new method of delivering services will replace the existing copper infrastructure such as telephone wires and coaxial cable. SMU started constructing the communications utility in 1999 and began offering service to customers in the fall of 2000.

“This will provide higher bandwidth to customers which will enable customers to experience video, Internet and voice services beyond our already reliable services,” adds Gloyd.

Since SMU first began offering Internet service to customers the amount used by customers has increased and we expect to see that continue. For example, the average peak usage from customers in the fall of 2010 was 125 MB and today it averages around 800 MB with maximums over 1,200 MB. The project to convert the whole town of Spencer will take several years and we continue to develop plans for future projects.