If you’re thinking of switching to FIOS in the Seattle area, here’s some feedback from one of my clients who recently had FIOS installed at his home in the Redmond area right near Microsoft.  I thought it would be helpful to share, since so many people are curious about it.

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“Fios is actually working really well now.  We had an initial snafu with the installation where basically it got installed into a switched outlet, and we didn’t realize.  So every time we’d shut off the lights in the garage our TV and internet would go out.  The package we got is $119/mo. (w/o taxes) and it includes unlimited domestic calls, not sure if it includes Canada or not, tons and tons of channels including over 80 HD ones, and super fast internet that I’ve been happy with so far.

We use the streaming Netflix service through the Xbox 360, and up until we got Fios we weren’t able to watch any of the streams as HD.  Now any of them that have HD enabled stream as HD.  It’s actually a bit cheaper than what we were paying before and we have more functionality (we had Comcast with Boost), but recently Comcast has released a $99/mo plan for similar services.  However, I am now convinced that Fios internet is more reliably fast. 

A couple gotchas that aren’t clear from the marketing material:

The bundled deal doesn’t include any set top box.  They cost $6/mo to rent one that doesn’t support HD, or $20/mo to rent one that does support HD (and is a DVR).  However, you can also get cable cards instead for $3/mo, so if you have something like a TiVo HD it’s better to choose that option.  In addition, the sales rep will tell you they don’t have M-series cards, but that’s incorrect.  We have an M-series card now.  The M-series allows you to use multiple tuners, where as the old cards only allow a single tuner.

By default Verizon will actually remove the copper line coming into your house.  It’s not clear why they do this outside of the fact that they are legally required to lease that line to competitors where as they don’t have the same restriction with their fiber optic cable.  That means that reverting to your old phone service or changing carriers is more difficult since you would need to get the line replaced (this shouldn’t affect internet or TV).”

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Hope this is helpful to anyone who might be installing FIOS soon in the Seattle or Eastside areas.

Winter’s here, and the ‘Chains Required’ notices are starting to flash in the passes. 

Do you sometimes wonder if that means you or not?  I drive an SUV and always drive by those signs about 92% sure that I’m OK – but not completely.

I finally looked up the winter tire chain requirements for Washington state, and because my SUV weighs less than 10,000 lbs I actually am OK, as long as my tires meet certain requirements.  Phew!

If you’d like to check what’s necessary for your car, here’s the link to winter tire chain requirements in Washington state.

This evening I was surprised to notice that the number 10 most emailed article in the New York Times was about Seattle’s Tuba Man, who died recently after being beaten by teenagers downtown.

It’s a nicely written piece, called “Seattle Bids Tuba Man a Sad Goodbye” – worth checking out.  (Click the title to read the article.)

Volunteers campaign to stop 60 Acres Park from being leased to LWYSA

 King County currently has over 1000 soccer fields.  Do we need another one?  That’s the question under review by the King County Council today, as they look at a proposed 30 year lease of the the public 60 Acres Park South in Redmond to the Lake Washington Youth Soccer Association (LWYSA.)

(What I hear from people involved is that this is already a done deal.  But you never know.)

Currently 60 Acres Park South is a wide grassy area with a small dedicated parking lot that borders the Sammamish River Trail on the south side of NE 116th St.  I park at the south area frequently to run with my dog, and most days see people flying model planes, families firing those little rockets off for their kids and people walking dogs.

60 Acres Park South

On a recent morning a hot air balloon was being loaded up after a flight

60 Acres Park North is already leased to the LWYSA

60 Acres Park South doesn’t get incredibly heavy usage, but it happens to be the only versatile park area like that along the Kenmore to Redmond corridor of the trail.  The rest have been leased to baseball or soccer associations like LWYSA, or are privately owned.

In addition, the park was purchased with voter approved bonds in 1968 as a regional park, which means its stated goal is “to primarily provide outdoor recreation not feasible in the urban environment.”  Turning it over to a private, single-use entity seems to contradict the established purpose of the park.

The field would be used for soccer 6 months of the year.  Experience with the currently leased 60 Acres Park North is that it’s often off-limits the rest of the year to protect the grass.  Model plane flyers report that police have asked them to leave when they’ve tried to use 60 Acres North for plane flying.

According to the LWYSA, the number of youth served by them is actually decreasing.  Their numbers show over 6400 members in 1998, a peak of 6916 in 2007, and 6543 in 2008 – not much of a change over a 10 year period.

What really bugs me about this (other than the feeling that public land is being commandeered for private use that doesn’t represent the general public’s interests very well) is the underlying assumption that the highest and best use of land is always the one that serves the greatest number of people.

Under that premise, development of national parks and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would also be a done deal.  It’s ironic that, given the local demographics, many of the people who are happy about the upcoming lease of 60 Acres South are probably also against drilling in ANWR.  I realize that those are bigger issues that would have much more serious ramifications, but essentially it boils down to the same argument.

Which makes me wonder – when the versatile open area at 60 Acres South needs to be converted to soccer fields because the 17 fields at 60 Acres North are not enough, what are we teaching kids about fair and reasonable use of public resources?

Whatever your thoughts, have your say. Here’s the page for the King County Councilmembers:

http://www.kingcounty.gov/council/councilmembers.aspx