CEDX

LIMBA and Islip MacArthur Airport's new Commissioner

UPDATED: 5/13/08 777's are too large for MacArthur, please note this correction.This morning we had the distinct pleasure of greeting the new Commissioner of Long Island MacArthur Airport (LIMA), Theresa Rizzuto. Her disarmingly modest and self-deprecating manner temporarily masks the display of a deep knowledge of the airline industry, garnered through over two decades of experience. That experience started with slinging eighty pound bags as a ramp service worker for United Airlines (UAL) in 1992. In that day, the petite powerhouse needed to lift twice as many bags as her male counterparts to be taken seriously. After having gained entry to the business through UAL’s diversity program, her hard work and talent drove her up the ranks, eventually supervising UAL’s operations at Newark Airport, in charge of a $30 million dollar budget, and a terminal that served six airlines. She capped her time at UAL with an assignment as hub manager at Dulles International in Washington DC, leading a staff of 1,600. Taking some time off the flight line in 1993, she stepped into her family’s orthotics business in Freeport in the role of Operations VP, before bringing her fashionably-shod feet to LIMA in February of this year.

Her talk opened with a recap of her experience and an expression of delight at coming back to Long Island after her stint in the Garden State, followed up by a description of the economic importance that LIMA has to the Town of Islip and Long Island. The meat of her presentation concerned the plans that she and the Town have to revitalize the airport, which has been underutilized in recent history. Some of her goals are adding carriers, redeveloping the west side of the airport, ( where I once took BOCES Airframe and Powerplant vocational courses, longer ago than I care to remember), renovating the western portion of the main terminal, adding wi-fi to the airport, and marketing LIMA as a more convenient alternative to the Port Authority Airports. Ms. Rizzuto also wants to accomplish these goals while keeping the airport the good neighbor that it is today. She emphasized the necessity of picking the right carriers to partner with, that will be in it for the long haul, and be a true partners, where the destination compliments the carrier.

Once again, the Q and A was lively, and I will summarize and paraphrase here:

LIMBA - LIRR President, Helena Williams pulls into our station

Helena Williams, newest, and first female President of the LIRR came to LIMBA today to give us an update on her first six months at the throttle of the nation’s busiest commuter railroad. Drew Scott of News 12 was in attendance and snagged a post-meeting interview. Ms. Williams has a long career in public service, from positions in New York City Government, Nassau County, and running the Long Island Bus division of the MTA. Her enthusiasm for the job is evident, and it is an exciting time to be at the LIRR, working on the first expansion of the system in over a hundred years, East Side Access (ESA). Her approach has focused on three key areas, safety, security, and service reliability. Her talk today was focused on the third area, reliability. She said that this was what has arisen most in her interactions with customers.

The two projects that will have the biggest impacts on service reliability will be ESA and the third track on the mainline between Floral Park and Hicksville. Ms. Williams is not a career railroader, but her demeanor, carriage, and experience appear to make her the right person for the job at the right time. For ESA to be a success, supporting projects in the region must also be implemented successfully, and the attempts by her predecessors to move these forward have met with ferocious resistance from those unwilling to shoulder burdens for the greater good. Her recommendation of Conquering Gotham as a reference bodes well for her prospects in completing the supporting projects. In presenting these projects, she spoke of sharing benefits and burdens on a bi-county, regional basis. To put it in a nutshell, ESA brings huge benefits to both counties, but Nassau must bear the burden of Main Line Corridor Improvements ( MLCI - third track ), and Suffolk must bear the burden of a new train storage yard somewhere. The third supporting project, trackwork in Jamaica, imposes burdens on the existing ridership, having to have things juggled while trackwork takes place within the space and time envelope already owned by the railroad.

Her description of the review process and emphasis on the railroad’s acceptance and integration of community feedback into the plans for MLCI, and a plausible description of road traffic conditions if the supporting projects don’t take place indicate that an understanding of the landscape and a recognition that different sales approach is necessary has arrived in Jamaica station on Track #1. A quick overview with light detail of some trouble spots and how MLCI can solve them shows an engaged manager with both strategic and tactical skills. All those skills will be called upon to guide the nation’s busiest railroad, running 728 daily trains with just about 1200 pieces of rolling stock carrying 289,000 customers per day.

Intra-island service was another highlight of her talk, where she described the integrated project to deal with County Road 39 construction. The LIRR’s shuttle service between Speonk and Montauk was a large, but not the only part, of this effort. She gave kudos to the East End planners that brought together van and carpooling services from LIRR stations to end destinations, plus communication facilities as a model for future projects. She emphasized the integration part of the equation, where the LIRR is part of a holistic approach to transportation, and transportation oriented development.

Once again, we had a lively Q & A session, which covered the prospects for additional shuttle service projects and the Moynihan Station/Farley Post Office project, which prompted a declaration by Ms. Williams that we should have her back for another meeting just to discuss the issues surrounding that particular item. We look forward to another informative Friday morning visit from Madame President.

Local Content means nothing without...

Delivery when and where it is relevant.  Lots of interesting initiatives are taking place now, but if you can only access local content from your house, or workplace, it does you no good when you're at the place that it's germane to, and that's the achilles heel of all these wonderful web 2.0 services.  They're only valuable when you're connected to them.  Right now, there's two mobile platforms that can make local content useful, and two networks to connect the content to the platform.  The former are the smartphone, and the laptop.   The latter are the cell data networks and wi-fi, in both hotspot and hotzone flavors.   As more dual-mode smartphones and wi-fi enabled mini-systems become available, that are not crippled by carriers like my Cingular E61 has been, relevant interactivity with local content will become more possible and popular.  The growth of public WLAN access, in whatever flavor will also drive this consumption, especially if presence applications make it easy to use multiple voice applications from a single device that has multiple radios ( both licensed and unlicensed or "open" spectrum )built into it.
 

GPS Based Advertising

I saw this post, and said, I'm ahead of Google, how can that be?  Each Hampton Jitney is equipped with a Wi-RAN unit that provides internet access to passengers and collects GPS locations of each bus.  See our Google Map here.  The system knows where the bus is, and digital signage can use this to present a customized message to riders of that particular bus or the bus fleet.  It's not ads delivered via radio, but there's at least twenty five to fifty people on each bus on each run that will see your message, even if they're not using the internet component of our solution.

Mr. Nadler goes to Ronkonkoma

Congressman Jerrold Nadler visited LIMBA this past friday, to inform us amateur policy wonks about the project to build the Brooklyn to New Jersey rail freight tunnel.  The Congressman, who is fond of saying his district runs from Nathan's to Zabar's, has been a champion of mass transit for his entire career in Congress and the NYS Legislature, opened his remarks with a recounting of how the opening of the Erie Canal lead to the explosive growth of the New York City region, due to it's becoming the lowest cost gateway to the interior of the country at the time.  The canal was followed by the Erie-Lackawanna railroad, which continued New York's rise.  However, we've stopped that innovation in transportation during the last half of the 20th century, and New York as a region has suffered for it.  The Congressman was quick to point out that the tunnel would not only benefit the city, but also Long Island.

Getting the Message Out

I've posted our Wi-RAN promo video on YouTube.  If you're a company that would like to get your message out to the select demographic that is a captive audience for at least an hour and a half, give us a ring at 877-906-8323.  If you're a bus line operator that would like to offer internet access on your buses and track where they are in one solution, ring us up too. You can make the access free, or paid, and sell online ad space also.  We can also tie you into hotspot networks that your passengers can use once they are off the bus, helping you develop relationships with businesses near your bus stops that want to bring your passengers into their businesses.  Our vehicle tracking system with its reporting capabilities can also help you meet your regulatory requirements regarding highway use taxes in multiple jurisdictions.

Fleet Week Special!

Bounding from shore to shore on Long Island, CEDX is putting to sea (or sound, as it is) with the Huntington Yacht Club.  The club has retained us to create and manage a Wi-Fi network for members and transients, covering the slips, moorings, and pool area.  The net will also cover most of Huntington Harbor.  CEDX will create accounts for the members, and transients will sign up online via credit card.  As we go forward, CEDX will help the club establish reciprocal roaming agreements with other clubs around Long Island and the eastern seaboard.  Members will also have access to onshore  and rolling Wi-RAN hotspots at no additional charge as part of our agreement.  The network should be operational in about two weeks.

Now I've Gone and Done It

Gerry Blackwell, writing in Wi-Fi Planet, has written a very nice synopsis of my entrepreneurial career to date, a pretty fair analysis of what's cooking with my various business ventures.  I sometimes refer to myself as the "Ralph Kramden" of technology, I do all kinds of nutty things, like putting Wi-Fi in a barbershop and on buses.  Throw it against the wall, and see if it sticks!  There's a couple of nits in the article, which may be my fault, as we conducted the interview while I was driving around between assignments.  Between all three companies that I have a hand in, there's fifteen employees altogether, and the Bluetooth onboard the Jitney is for internal apps, not public access.  But that may not be a bad idea, thanks Gerry!

Next stop, Wi-Fi on the MTA, hopefully!

It was Kismet, plus a lot of hard work, as Wi-Fi returns to Kismet

After months of delay and waiting through weeks of miserable winter weather once the paperwork was done, Wi-Fi has returned to the petite village of Kismet, the westernmost community on Fire Island.  Perched atop the beautiful new Fire House, our relocated Saltaire access point is broadcasting the SSID FIWISPSALT out to the Marina, the homes, the Fire Island Lighthouse, and the western edge of Saltaire.  Many thanks go out to the Fire Commissioners of Kismet, and we at Fire Island Wireless look forward to reliably serving the Fire Department and the community with wireless broadband for many seasons into the future.

Assemble the Fleet!

The next wave of Hampton Jitney Wi-RANs has been launched.  Our primary target for this service has been the Manhattan to the Hamptons market, but  Hampton Jitney runs special NASCAR race tours, so our Wi-Fi really roams, and we get to kick the tires on the nation's networks.  Last week, a tour went to Bristol, Tennessee for a race, and folks were surfing the web on that really long ride.

If you're on any of the following twelve buses, you're connected with Wi-RAN:

                       

51
56
62
66
67
68
75
76
83
84
86
89

Twelve down, and twenty-four to go!