Maine's Three Ring Binder network gets underway

With its $25.4 million broadband stimulus grant in hand, the Maine Fiber Company is now taking out their shovels to build its Three Ring Binder middle mile network.

As reported by Bangor, Maine NBC affiliate WLBZ Channel 2, leaders of the Maine Fiber Company held a ribbon-cutting ceremony in Brunswick Maine to celebrate the buildout of the first five miles of the new network. Work on several additional miles of the network will begin this fall.

In total, the Three Ring Binder will consist of 1,100 fiber network miles constructed in three rings covering all of Maine. When the network is completed, Maine Fiber will sell local ISPs and other service provider's wholesale capacity they will use to deliver services to their respective residential and business customers.

Getting to the buildout phase has been anything but easy for Maine Fiber Network. The network faced significant protest from Maine's dominant incumbent service provider FairPoint Communications, which--despite missing its own broadband expansion promises in the state--argued that the Three Ring Binder was nothing more than "a government-funded duplication of its own fiber optic network."

For more:
- WLBZ has this post

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