Fergie's Tech Blog

Northern Virginia municipality lets Verizon offer cable TV

Having lived and worked in Northern Virginia for many years prior to moving to Texas, this turn of events should prove interesting in the coming months.

Elissa Silverman writes in The Washington Post:

The Herndon [Virginia] Town Council yesterday agreed to let Verizon Communications Inc. begin offering cable television service, putting the small Northern Virginia city at the forefront of a developing battle between the nation's major telephone and cable companies.

By a 6 to 0 vote, the council approved Verizon's request to compete with Cox Communications Inc., which holds a monopoly cable franchise for the city of 22,000.

Though city officials said they were disappointed that Verizon rejected some of its requests -- including one that the company bury fiber-optic cables it recently strung alongside its old copper telephone lines -- they decided in the end that competition for cable service would benefit consumers.

posted by Fergie @ 7/20/2005 06:19:00 AM