Through the end of September the Vermont Department of Public Service and the Agency of Transportation will be conducting drive tests on more than 6,500 miles of state roads to determine the actual level of mobile wireless coverage. The state is also asking state residents to help gather data along private roads and areas such as public parks and gathering places. Department of Public Service Director of Telecommunications and Connectivity Clay Purvis led a smaller scale drive test four years ago and is coordinating this effort. He tells WAMC North Country Bureau Chief Pat Bradley there are variable levels of service especially in rural areas of the state, and the tests determine the accuracy of current coverage maps.
We're driving all the roads and we're testing the level of service on a statewide basis and putting it on a map. So you'll be able to see where you have service and where you don't. This is different from the coverage maps that you might see published in advertising material or even published by like the Federal Communications Commission, the FCC, in that we're not making guesstimates about the level of service based on what we think the coverage should be. We're actually testing whether there's service or not. We're testing the download speed, the upload speed and we're testing voice call availability as we drive down these roads.
When the carriers are saying, well we have this much coverage, why is there that discrepancy with what they have versus what you're going out and doing?
There has been a history, I think, within this industry of overstating coverage. Even coverage maps, like I said that the Federal Communications Commission publishes, that show that they have coverage when they know they don't. And we did the same drive tests back in 2018 under a little different circumstances. But we set out on that drive test to challenge maps that the FCC was publishing to show that they are wrong. And we showed widespread discrepancies between what they were showing for coverage and what we actually found to be available coverage along these roads. We know there's been new developments, new cell deployments throughout the state. We've had the FirstNet project almost fully deployed now. And so we want to update that information and find out exactly where we still have gaps left that need to be filled. A part of this project allows for consumers to do their own testing at home. Ookla has a commercially available application called the Speedtest app that consumers can download. And so consumers taking tests in Vermont, starting now through September 30th, can take tests. They're free. And that will be included in the composite map that Ookla provides to us at the end of the project. So if your road is not on the schedule you can do your own testing, either at home, wherever you work, in places where you might walk. We do discourage people from doing their own driving. We don't want to have people use their cell phones while they're driving. But in places that are important to you, you can take your own speed test and we'll include that in our data. But we certainly want people to test safely. So pulling off your favorite pull off spot where you know you lost service is a good place to test or park in a parking lot. Places where you work, you know, church, places where you recreate, your friends' houses, your family's houses, places you go are great places to do these tests. And that really helps us increase the amount of data we're collecting and helps us get some of those really far out places where the AOT (Agency of Transportation) drivers might not necessarily get to.
Clay, once you gather all this data, how will it be used for practical application?
It can be used in a variety of ways. First, it can be used and will be used to inform public policy with regard to the wireless industry, especially if there's an opportunity to use public funding to increase the availability of mobile wireless coverage. We did have a proposal in the governor's proposed budget this past year to use some of the American Rescue Plan funds to build cell towers. Unfortunately, the legislature chose not to adopt that proposal. But there might be opportunities like that again in the future. And we think this data will help really kind of show folks where the coverage gaps, where they exist and where they need to be filled. The other aspect is for municipal and regional planning for towns to know where they need to have coverage or where they lack coverage will help them develop town plans, especially around the siting of telecommunications towers. That can sometimes be a hot button local issue because of aesthetics and other kind of land use concerns that goes into the deployment of these facilities. So we think its helpful data in that regard. And then just to have the truth out there, I think for consumers to be able to see exactly what the level of service is and isn't in their communities is very helpful. Even consumers, just picking a cell plan you know, which cell provider is going to be the best for my family is a question we often get. And these maps really help with that. So there's a variety of uses for them. Ideally, these maps would be used to correct mistakes with coverage maps that are published by the Federal Communications Commission. At this time, we're not sure if we're able to use this data for that purpose. But if nothing else there's a public record out there that calls into question the assertions of coverage that the industry would make or if they validate what the industry is saying that's also good too. It shows that prior issues of overstating coverage have been resolved.
Individuals can submit data through September.
