A New Pitch for WiFi

Please forgive The VAR Guy for dragging a bit today. He’s on his second cup of coffee after spending most of last night at Shea Stadium in New York … suffering through a three hour rain delay before the umpire said “Play Ball.” During the delay, The VAR Guy downed two burgers and a Carvel sundae before reading up on a new stadium the Mets plan to open in 2009. Just like every other big stadium, it will feature state-of-the-art wireless capabilities.

That got The VAR Guy thinking: How will stadium networks increasingly mesh with city and county broadband projects? And what applications–beyond WiFi video replays–will stadiums deploy? By 2009, he looks forward to ordering another sundae from his box seats using his iPhone–which Apple will surely discount to $498 by that time. Hmmm. That future isn’t so far away.

In fact, many CIOs are already talking about these new applications. San Francisco Giants CIO Bill Schlough has been on the speaking circuit ever since the Giants moved into a state-of-the-art stadium in 2000. And Steve Conley, director of IT at the Boston Red Sox, will be on hand at MuniWireless 2007: New England to discuss his team’s WiFi, VoIP and broadband applications.

Many of these IT projects extend well beyond the playing field. Consider the situation in Dallas, Texas, USA: Hillwood Development and Perot Systems worked with BelAir Networks and Red One Network Solutions to deploy a wireless broadband mesh network throughout Victory Park,a 75 acre urban development in downtown Dallas that includes major sports facilities and entertainment centers.