Blackpool recaptures conference glory days with new wireless network

Council hopes free internet access for delegates and tourists will bring more people to the resort

Blackpool's reputation as a traditional destination for party political conferences has been eroded in recent years, but the county council is hoping that its investment in a public wireless network covering the town centre's conferencing facilities will help it to reclaim its former glory.

The seaside town has built an extensive wireless infrastructure covering Blackpool Tower ballroom, the Winter Gardens, the Hilton Hotel, and town centre cafés and restaurants, which visitors can access for free using vouchers distributed by the council.

"Historically, Blackpool has been a major conference centre for political parties, but that has been a bit of a disappointment in recent times since the renaissance of Liverpool and Manchester as alternatives," says Tony Doyle, head of ICT at Blackpool County Council.

"There was a perceived lack of conference facilities in Blackpool and the town was looking tired, even though we have this fabulous Victorian complex, as well as the Winter Gardens and the tower ballroom."

Construction of the network infrastructure supporting the Wireless Blackpool service was begun in mid 2008, and now encompasses a mix of different wireless technologies, including an Airspan WiMax base station bolted to the side of Blackpool Tower.

This interconnects a range of other 802.11g Wi-Fi access points attached to CCTV columns or lamp posts that provide outdoor street-level connectivity, with Wi-Fi signals delivered inside cafés, restaurants and other retail outlets using Ruckus wireless signal extenders.

To prove its wireless credentials, Blackpool hosted the National Association for Computers in Education (NAACE) conference earlier this year, jumping in to boost wireless access after delegates the year before had complained that the Blackpool Hilton hotel's own Wi-Fi service was not up to scratch.

"It was a deal breaker for them – the educational techies push the limit of any network, especially with 400 delegates getting key note presentations, video streaming and live twitter feeds pushing peak time bandwidth usage to 80-90Mbit/s, and the hotel asked if we could help support that event," says Doyle.

Other key events held in the town recently include the Royal Variety Performance and ITV's Strictly Come Dancing with all the demands that modern internet media puts on wireless internet access.

True to Blackpool's eclectic traditions, the network has also supported everyone from roadies helping to organise music gigs, players at a beach volleyball tournament, and smaller conferences for young farmers and pigeon fanciers.

"When we started out we were just looking to upgrade our wireless facilities, but now we have the network we are able to tap into demand that we perhaps never appreciated was there previously," says Doyle.

All wireless access is currently provided free of charge, and the council believes its original £150,000 investment in the necessary infrastructure is well worth it if it helps bring more conference delegates and tourists into Blackpool.

Besides the upfront capital provided by the local economic growth initiative (LEGI), Doyle and his colleagues within Blackpool County Council IT department have put a lot of their own time into configuring and supporting the network, including taking support calls from end-users, such as BBC journalists needing to send FTP footage back to their studios. ICT service provider Synetrix also helped with the implementation and ongoing maintenance of the network.

The council has also used the wireless network for its own staff, supporting greater numbers of remote, mobile and flexible workers and being able to consolidate its own office space as a result.

Doyle says the council has to be careful about who it lets onto the network, especially as it links into the council's fibre-optic backbone as well as networks in schools, libraries and other local government and education locations.

A conference delegate will submit identity information as part of the registration, council workers passport into the VPN, and educational users get very different Internet access policies depending on who they are.

"It is still clunky in terms of recording personal details and we are looking to improve that but we are conscious of legislation and compliance around storing people's personal details and acceptable user policies, so we have to make sure the network is up to the job first," said Doyle.

The responsibility for managing an untrusted open network is not to be taken lightly, and the council uses a Fortinet Unified Threat Management (UTM) device for provision of core firewalls, anti-virus and filtering services.

With the pot of money from LEGI having dried up now due to recent budget cuts, Doyle is searching for ways to continue investment in Wireless Blackpool by exploring alternative commercial arrangements.

"We have long-term issues around sustainability – we may hit some issues generating capital to carry on feeding and watering the network – so we need to explore possibilities around advertising and tourism, as well as consider aggregating the network with other wireless providers as opposed to delivering the service in-house," says Doyle.

"Nothing is firmed up yet, but we may also look into developing a more generic shared infrastructure as part of streetlight alert system or networked traffic lights, for example."