VTS in Alexandria, VA had just one T1 for its more than 250 student body. It was having many issues with the Internet speed during the day in class and at night in its dormitories. The situation was disruptive during classroom instruction when students were all referred to a web site to download files which were a few Megs each. When 25 or more students tried to download any large files, the T1 would simply come to a halt interrupting classroom instruction.
VTS investigated a bonded T1 solution as well as bonded DSL solutions and fiber connections to increase its capacity. They were all impractical and expensive. A bonded DSL carrier was engaged for a few months with very little success. VTS then searched for fiber connectivity yet fiber was not available to its campus and the cost to provide it would be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
In came Trident’s wireless solution, which was the only other alternative remaining. Even though the campus location had limited line of sight connection to Trident’s closet hub, which was 7 miles away, the only location on the campus suitable for wireless equipment was the campus church steeple. The steeple which was considered a historical landmark was off-limits to any equipment in its exterior and thus useless as a tower location. However, since the steeple had thin windows without lead, it could accommodate the Trident radio inside.
Consequently an installation was performed and Trident was able to provide VTS with 20 mbits/sec of bandwidth, a multiple of 13 times its existing bandwidth. All VTS capacity problems were alleviated with this new setup. The frequency used, was an unlicensed frequency and as a result quite cost effective and powerful with no effect from weather or radio interference.
In this case, Trident was able to provide a creative solution, using its wireless network for a difficult geographical location for a client with special needs.