Durban - Durban’s iconic Florida Road – a bustling row of cafes, restaurants, clubs and hotels – framed within historical Edwardian structures, has become the first of many urban streets to be lit up by super-fast WiFi.
“Florida Road is a great place to demonstrate the possibilities that high-speed WiFi enables,” says Nathier Kasu, general manager at MWEB WiFi. “We’ve created a WiFi zone, rather than a WiFi hotspot, to deliver a superior experience to users, wherever they may be on the high street.”
WiFi hotspots, he adds, tend to be single access points, with limited capacity and scalability as new users join the network, and a poorer overall performance. By contrast, a WiFi zone features multiple access points, meshed together in a single indoor or outdoor environment with more resilient infrastructure and powerful backhaul – with the result being consistent, fast internet access.
“Our vision here is to augment the real-world experiences of restaurants, coffee shops, and hotels, with a digital experience that allows people to connect more, stream more, capture more and, simply, do more,” explains Kasu.
LinkAfrica provided high-speed fibre links to create connectivity solutions in key streets that have a high concentration of hospitality and entertainment activity such as Helen Joseph Road (formally Davenport Road) Problem Mkhize Road (formally Cowey Road), Florida Road and Chartwell Drive to name a few. Other properties include selected hotels and hospitals across Ethekwini.
The initiative by MWEB to bring WiFi to Florida Road and other properties in the area has been welcomed by Durban Tourism’s head Phillip Sithole. “As a city we are excited to see the expansion of super-fast uncapped WiFi across Durban.
MWEB WiFi will further boost the Florida Road area as it is also used as a meeting venue for business people as well as local residents.”
Over the coming months, he notes that consumers will start benefitting from a broadening network of WiFi zones at strategic hubs around South Africa – from airports, to shopping malls to popular social venues.