Ultrafast broadband (UFB) networking steadily continues in the Wakatipu, but what comes next if fibre is installed on your doorstep and what about those households missing out? James Beech investigates.
The network capability map of the Wakatipu on the Chorus website is a patchwork of blues, reds and greens to illustrate where New Zealand's largest telecommunications utility company has delivered the future of the internet to homes, schools, hospitals and businesses.
For residents, the pupils of all three central schools and operators in downtown Queenstown, the future has already arrived, from the top of the industrial spread up Gorge Rd, down to One Mile and across to the gardens and Queenstown Hill, ending at a jagged boundary reaching the end of Park St.
Two-thirds of the residential estate of Jack's Point also has ultrafast broadband (UFB) available.
UFB is installed beneath the pavement in the dark blue patches to provide the optimal internet speed of up to 100Mbps (megabits per second).
A single megabit is about the same as a 500-page book, or six seconds of uncompressed audio from a compact disc.
Light blue covers Fernhill and Sunshine Bay, York St east on to Wakatipu Heights and the terraces above and below Frankton Rd, all the way to Frankton itself, its two primary schools, hospital, airport and Kelvin Heights, plus most of Frankton Flats to overlap Shotover Country.
All these areas are scheduled to have UFB installed and connection ready by a service provider by June 2016.
For residents who are left with patched-up pavements and green cables sticking out of the ground, their next step if they want to be connected is to call the three service providers in Queenstown.
Chorus made the new information superhighway, but it is Orcon, Snap and Telecom who drive on it.
Call them to find out what plans are available to connect to fibre and make the choice. Technicians need to physically connect the fibre from the street to the home and it can take a few hours, usually at no cost to the user.
However, there may be a small installation cost for homes which are part of a multi-dwelling unit, or for homes which have a driveway longer than 200m.
There is a small installation cost to businesses, usually equivalent to about two months of telephone and internet service costs, but this investment was usually balanced by increased productivity and efficiency savings, Chorus spokeswoman Elissa Downey, of Auckland, said.
''Our recent survey of more than 500 Kiwi businesses found that the key drivers for using faster broadband are to `do more with less', and increase productivity,'' she said.
''There's some compelling evidence that getting online and utilising online tools can deliver real benefits for businesses.
''A McKinsey survey of almost 5000 small to medium enterprises across 12 developed broadband markets found that businesses with a high web presence delivered twice the annual growth of companies with a low web presence,'' Ms Downey said.
Central Queenstown and its immediate suburbs may be covered by UFB, but it is not economically possible to connect every home in the country.
Arthur's Point, Lake Hayes Estate, Arrowtown, Gibbston, Jack's Point and Kingston will instead be covered by the rural broadband initiative. Glenorchy appears to have been left out for the time being.
The joint project with Vodafone intends to enhance the existing copper infrastructure for broadband by running fibre to cell towers to improve mobile connections and download and upload capability.
4G network
Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch will have 4G from Telecom starting on November 12, but the company does not have a date for when it will introduce the next generation network to Queenstown.
The auction by the Government of the 700MHz spectrum range at the end of the month will influence how far and wide Telecom uses the 1800MHz range for 4G services.
The 700MHz range offers better economics of coverage in less populous areas than 1800MHz.
However, as an indication of what Wakatipu customers can expect, Telecom's 4G will be available to both prepaid and pay-monthly customers in those three cities at no extra cost on Telecom's current plans.
''Whether they are shopping online, streaming music or making stutter-free video calls to family and friends, 4G will allow our customers to do a whole lot more, a whole lot faster on their mobile devices,'' Telecom retail chief executive Chris Quin said.
''It will also allow businesses to stimulate more efficient ways of working remotely with teams on the road able to make reliable video calls, download pictures and documents in seconds and use cloud services on their mobiles.''
To access 4G, customers will need to be in a coverage area, own a 4G-capable phone which has been enabled to work on the Telecom mobile network and upgrade to a 4G sim card.
Most higher-end mobile devices introduced over the past year or so are 4G-capable, and more devices will be launched in coming weeks.
Telecom rival Vodafone launched its 4G in Queenstown and Wanaka in June, before the start of the snowsports season and winter festival. Queenstown was the first South Island provincial town and only the third in New Zealand to get the fastest mobile network technology.
Vodafone is expected to switch on 4G in Dunedin and Invercargill in the first quarter of next year, although the Octagon in Dunedin is expected to be 4G-enabled before Christmas.
Welcome to Gigatown
Queenstown could win the prize for fastest broadband in the southern hemisphere, if it takes part in the national Chorus competition ''Welcome to Gigatown''.
The year-long competition aims to spark innovation and mobilise the potential of ultrafast broadband to transform grassroots economies and services to drive better outcomes for New Zealand communities.
The prize is the boosted capability of one-gigabit per second broadband speeds - up to 100 times faster than most cities around the globe.
Chorus head of marketing and sales Victoria Crone said the one-gigabit fibre broadband would be deployed in the New Zealand town which showed New Zealand it had the most desire to be Gigatown.
All communities covered by Chorus' ultrafast fibre build plans, including Queenstown, will be eligible to enter the competition.
Welcome to Gigatown is expected to launch on Labour Day this year, the winning town to be announced in early 2015.
