TDS brings broadband to 2,000 rural customers in Wisconsin, Virginia and Alabama

TDS Telecom (NYSE: TDS) is close to completing four new broadband stimulus projects in Wisconsin, Virginia and Alabama, expanding service to more than 2,000 new potential customers when the projects are completed this spring. It's all thanks to a series of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) broadband stimulus grants.

When it completes its two projects in Wisconsin, TDS will connect another 1,200 residents to broadband service. In the Neillsville, Wis., area, TDS' Badger Telecom project will provide nearly 870 customers with Internet service. The telco is in the process of installing about 70 miles of fiber cabling and 23 remote terminal (RT) cabinets that will house necessary broadband loop carrier equipment that will connect the town's residential and business customers.

Serving areas around Bagley and Mt. Hope in its Grantland Telecom exchange, the second Wisconsin project will bring broadband service to about 350 residents that could not get service before. The telco is installing about 70 miles of fiber and nine RT cabinets.

Over in Alabama, TDS' Butler Telephone Company will extend service to about 500 residents near Grove Hill. It is installing about 90 miles of fiber cabling and eight RT cabinets.

Finally, the project around Paint Bank and Abbott, Va., will serve about 300 residents in TDS' New Castle Telephone Company exchange from six new RT cabinets.

These latest projects follow two more broadband stimulus-funded projects, bringing Internet service to an additional 2,000 households in parts of New Hampshire and Alabama.

TDS received funding for 44 projects from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Rural Utilities Service (RUS). It expects to have a total of 27,000 additional customers connected to broadband by the end of Q1 2014.

For more:
- see the release

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