Comcast expands internet into Coral Springs. What took so long?
Telecommunications giant Comcast is expanding its Xfinity internet, cable and phone service into Coral Springs.
No, you haven’t been transported via a time loop back to the late 1990s.
The ubiquitous cable provider and largest Internet service provider in the United States is entering western Coral Springs neighborhoods for the first time and plans to compete with longtime cable provider Blue Stream Fiber and AT&T, which also delivers service via fiber optic lines.
Once the expansion is complete later this year, Comcast plans to serve up to 15,000 homes and businesses in the city — up from 2,000 current Xfinity subscribers, spokesman Steve Campion told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Fiber lines being installed along utility easements will provide residential customers with Internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second (Gbps) and up to 100 Gbps for businesses, a news release from Comcast said this week.
Construction is underway in residential areas west of University Drive, the release said. Crews broke ground last year at the intersection of Northwest 28th Street and Southwest 94th Avenue. Work is currently taking place near Northwest 49th Place and Northwest 89th Terrace and will continue up and down Westview Drive and 86th Way.
Next in line will be the area between Coral Ridge Drive and Coral Springs Drive, from West Sample Road to Royal Palm Boulevard.
One possible reason that Comcast waited so long to build its fiber optic cable network into the city dates back to the 1970s and to an era when cities required cable companies to enter into franchise agreements.
Back then, Coral Springs contracted with a company called Coral Springs Cablevision Inc. and collected 3% of the company’s gross revenue under a 15-year contract. The service offered nine viewing channels, one stock market channel, a weather channel, a Reuters news channel and a “first-run” movie channel, and the opportunity for the city to operate its own channel, according to a March 5, 1975, story in the Fort Lauderdale News.
Customers were charged $8 for the 12 channels and $6 a month for the movie channel.
In 1978, Schurz Communications bought the company and renamed it Advanced Cable Communications. Twenty years later, in 1998, Advanced Cable bought Gulf & Pacific Communications’ contract to provide cable service to the newly formed city of Weston. With it, came developer Arvida’s requirement that forced nearly all Weston homes to purchase cable TV service from the company.
Residents complained about the lack of choices, and Weston took steps to make the cable subscription voluntary. Advanced Cable sued the city in federal court in 2004, but a judge sided with the city the next year. Advanced Cable then settled the dispute by agreeing to end the controversial contract in 2013.
Meanwhile, the franchise agreement with Coral Springs continued, with the city requiring Advanced Cable to install fiber cable “for exclusive city use,” according to its 2004 Capital Improvement Budget.
But in 2007, the state stripped cities’ authority to require franchise agreements and instead shifted franchising authority to the state.
Comcast finished expanding into Weston about a decade ago, Comcast spokeswoman Sydney Freeman said.
Schurz sold Advanced Cable in 2016 to Twin Point Capital, which renamed it to Blue Stream in 2016.
In recent years, Coral Springs residents said they asked Comcast whether its service is available to them and were told that the company wasn’t allowed into the city.
Coral Springs spokeswoman Paula Rubiano said the city never granted exclusive rights or contracts to any cable or Internet provider, including Advanced Cable Communications or its successor, Blue Stream. “This has been a longstanding misconception,” she said.
“The city has always maintained an open-door policy for competition among service providers,” Rubiano said. “Any provider willing to invest in the necessary infrastructure and meet the technical and regulatory requirements is welcome to serve our community. In Comcast’s case, decisions about expansion timelines and investments were entirely within the company’s control.”
In 2016, AT&T announced the launch of its “GigaPower” internet service in Coral Springs.
Whether the “longstanding misconception” prevented Comcast from expanding into the city earlier is unknown. Blue Stream did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Comcast’s announcement.
Asked why Comcast hasn’t come sooner, Campion, the company’s spokesman, said, “Comcast as a whole is always looking at what makes a good business decision, or what makes the most business sense. When it comes to expanding our network — and we’ve been doing it across different parts of Florida — (the company decided) now is the time that the business felt that Coral Springs was a good place to go.”
Rafael Visbal, vice president of market development for Comcast’s Florida region, was quoted in the release as saying, “We heard from the community. Today, we’re answering their call by building a network ready for tomorrow. Once our network is online, families, entrepreneurs and home-based businesses will have the reliability and speed they need.”
Ron Hurtibise covers business and consumer issues for the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He can be reached by phone at 954-356-4071 or by email at rhurtibise@sunsentinel.com.