Nelson’s investment in fibre infrastructure is about empowering our community. By partnering with local service providers, we ensure that businesses, schools, and organizations have the digital tools they need to succeed—today and into the future.

Phase 1 - Network Costs Savings

Between 1998 and 2005 the city had the insight to connect Nelson Fire Rescue, Nelson Police, Nelson Museum, Archives & Gallery, public works, Nelson Hydro, Nelson Public Library, and city hall, with fibre optics. This enabled the centralization of the phone systems, servers, and internet access, resulting in cost savings for connecting our city departments.

Phase 2 - Secure Anchor Tenants

In 2012, the Regional District partnered with the city of Nelson to run new fibre optic cable connecting their Lakeside offices with the community complex and city hall. The RDCK now saves substantially on communication costs.

In 2014, the city of Nelson and the Province of BC partnered to connect all the schools and Selkirk College facilities over the fibre optic network. This opportunity allowed the fibre optic network to expand into Rosemont, Fairview, and Uphill. These educational sites can now benefit from speeds up to 40 Gbps (gigabits per second), to help provide learning tools to students and teachers within Nelson.

Phase 3 - Share with Local Organizations

When Nelson Hydro migrated their downtown primary overhead distribution power lines to underground, the city took the opportunity to install additional communications conduit. These conduits now provide downtown businesses the opportunity to connect to Nelson Fibre.

In 2015, the city started to provide the benefits of fibre optic technology to the local business community.  The city has residential rates for potential downtown residents, but has no current financial plans, or service providers, to deliver municipal fibre to residential neighbourhoods in Nelson.  The target customer emphasis remains the business community, non-profit associations and strategic partners.