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Google Sets Up Free Public WiFi In Chelsea, Creating Biggest NYC WiFi Network
By
Jen Chung
Published Jan 8, 2013
Modified Jan 8, 2013
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By
Jen Chung
Published Jan 8, 2013
Modified Jan 8, 2013
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Google, which purchased a huge building in Chelsea a few years ago, is now giving something back to its neighborhood: The search behemoth is offering free public WiFi across southwest Chelsea.
Mayor Bloomberg and Senator Charles Schumer are joining Google CIO Ben Fried for the announcement right now, which will also offer factoids like how it's the first wired neighborhood in Manhattan and how it's the largest contiguous WiFi network in NYC.
The network will be available from Gansevoort Street to 19th Street, from Eighth Avenue to the West Side Highway and includes the Chelsea Triangle, 14th Street Park, and Gansevoort Plaza. Clearly, this also means that when the weather gets better, you'll be able to search Google for restaurants near the High Line when you're ON the High Line.
Fried said at the ceremony, "Google is proud to provide free WiFi in the neighborhood we have called home for over 6 years. This network will not only be a resource for the 2000+ residents of the Fulton Houses [part of the NYC Housing Authority], it will also serve the 5,000+ student population of Chelsea as well as the hundreds of workers, retail customers and tourists who visit our neighborhood every day." And Mayor Bloomberg said, "New York is determined to become the world’s leading digital city, and universal access to high-speed Internet is one the core building blocks of that vision. Thanks to Google, free WiFi across this part of Chelsea takes us another step closer to that goal.”
Google has about 3,000 employees at its NYC office.
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Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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