| Arizona Telecommunications & Information Council (ATIC) | |||
| Multitenant Building Telecommunications Access Study | |||
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Varying Points of View:
Tenants and Economic Development Interests:
Both business and residential tenants, for their part, have come to expect relatively unfettered access to a growing variety of telecommunications solutions and providers. Their broadband telecom mantra has become more, better, faster, cheaper. And they are beginning to experience the wealth of applications and benefits to the convergence of voice, data, and video services across simpler, faster networks based on Internet Protocol (IP). Business' workers are increasingly connected at their desktops to enterprise Local Area Networks (LANs) and peripherals, as well as across multiple locations of the company via their Wide Area Network (WAN), and to the Internet at large. Mobile and remote workers are still dialing in with phone line modems or connecting via a higher speed Internet connection to telework, but are increasingly operating from the field with emergent wireless technology for effective mobility. And at home, we're coming to expect to stay connected with the outside world with integrated information appliances, both wired and wireless, and high bandwidth Internet access. Our home will have an increasing proliferation of "smart" networked devices, computers, and peripherals all connected by residential LANs through wires or through the air.
| Cities have a choice, to aggressively embrace information technology as a catalyst for transforming life and work in the 21st century, or be cut off from the mainstream of economic development. | |
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-- John Eger, The World Foundation for Smart Communities in Government Technology, September 1997 |
There have been quite a number of high-profile Smart Buildings projects around the nation and across the world. Though undertakings such as New York's 55 Broad St. (http://www.nyitc.com/) garner much attention in the popular and trade press, more modest yet significant regional projects often go unnoticed. Here in Arizona, a local initiative, the Tech Oasis Project, in conjunction with the Arizona Software & Internet Association (AZSOFT.net) and the City of Tempe, seeks to create a regional geographic cluster for software and Internet businesses that will act as a catalyst to further those businesses, the regional economy, and the Phoenix area to the technology industry. The City has incorporated Smart Building and open telecommunications access expectations and requirements into the Infotech Center proposal for the redevelopment of a 3.5 acre parcel with Arizona State University (ASU). Excerpts from the draft RFP can be found in Appendix 5. Additionally the Tech Oasis Committee is collecting and organizing a Valley-wide inventory of tech friendly properties, producing a checklist for tenant telecom considerations, an online resource guide to regional telecommunications equipment and service vendors, and a comprehensive infrastructure map overlaying various vendors major network infrastructure investments and planned expansion.
| Global networking is creating a fundamentally new kind of business model that is challenging the very basis of society and economics. The Internet and information network technologies are not only a means for communication and discourse, but a distribution mechanism for trade in goods and services, a business model that is driven by changes in consumer behavior, and a force that is spurring the creation of new savings, investment and industry structures. The horizontal, open and deregulated nature of the on-line environment is also transforming social structures and society overall. The redefinition of business, societies and the global economy as a whole is putting great pressure on private industry and governments to rapidly reform their policies and practices in order to become competitive within a rapidly changing global environment. | |
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-- From the Global Information Infrastructure Commission (GIIC) Call for Action, 12/03/99 (http://www.gii.org/events/ann5call.html) |
Higher bandwidth is increasingly required to support today's e-business initiatives and to transport rich media and information flows. Though the business and residential tenants face somewhat different problems of access and of deciding what technologies are available and appropriate, they are both largely intolerant of barriers to competitive telecom access. They want the flexibility to perform tenant improvements (TIs) and to have the unfettered ability to negotiate for competitive services and implement evolving enterprise solutions. And the smart business tenants of today are considering their needs and telecommunications access in site selection, building lease negotiations, and in the architecture and design of their spaces.
| How Workplace Trends Impact Office Design: | |
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Knowledge sharing: Less emphasis on private space and greater emphasis on shared spaces. Use of electronic whiteboards and other means of capturing and sharing knowledge.
Collaborative work: A variety of flexible, shared spaces, including pods, conference areas and social spaces. Modular furniture and walls on wheels. Intensive use of all vertical and horizontal surfaces. Flattened hierarchy: Rank not reflected in physical surroundings. Space owned by groups, rather than individuals. Variety of spaces that accommodate all work modes: private, collaborative, video conferencing, and spontaneous social encounters. Rapidly evolving technology: Persistence of technology inside and outside of the facility. Real-time access to corporate intranets and extranets. Plug-and-play furniture that docks to power sources in ceilings, walls, floors, columns, etc. Mobility: The ability to plug in portable devices anywhere, any time. Churn: Flexible environments in which furniture and technology can be rearranged spontaneously without the assistance of a facility manager. All of the above trends point toward flexible, varied spaces within facilities that balance the need for privacy with the ability to collaborate and meet current technology needs while anticipating future trends. |
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-- The Anti-Office of the Future by Marianne Cotter, Knowledge Management 01/00 |
Even the residential tenant increasingly expects to set up a smart household with home networks to share access among family members to the Internet, files on different home PCs, printers, and other peripherals. Additionally, they will temporarily connect their mobile information appliances and laptops for in-home use and employ the same home networks for messaging, multimedia content distribution, environmental control, remote monitoring, and security. Embedded smarts within household appliances, audio/video equipment, and various microcomputer-enabled devices will all converse together over home networks and various wired and wireless pathways, changing the very nature of our dwellings.
Apartment and other Multitenant Dwelling Unit (MDU) residents can not afford to be disenfranchised from the wonders and benefits of the telecom transformation already underway. The needs of residential tenants may receive special legislative, regulatory, or judicial recognition, protection, and treatment. For example, the FCC's Over-the-Air Reception Rules prohibit restrictions that impair the installation, maintenance or use of antennas used to receive video programming less than one meter in size on property one owns, rents or over which one has exclusive use or control. Meanwhile an explosion of wireless technologies and data-centric telecom services will augment the increasingly inventive uses of wired infrastructure by the ILECs, CLECs, DLECs, and cable system operator, all reaching out to serve business and residential tenants.
| Multitenant Building Telecommunications Access Study | |||
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