Extending High Speed Internet in Rural Virginia - the "One More to Go" Project
Bath County, Virginia - Residents of Mountain Grove, located in the westernmost part of Bath County, will soon have access to high-speed internet and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) connections for the first time through MGW Telephone Company. MGW has been the area’s telephone provider since 1967 and has focused on connecting rural Virginia with the latest technologies for over 50 years. Areas like Mountain Grove are often overlooked because of challenging topography and a low population density that doesn’t make providing service financially lucrative.
However, these challenges are precisely why Ron Smith started MGW. Seeing the inequity that rural central Virginia faced by not having telephone service, Smith spent his weekends going door-to-door in mountain communities that bigger telephone companies were leaving behind – and that tradition continues as new technologies arise. This year alone, MGW installed about 60 miles of fiber optic cable, primarily in the counties of Bath & Highland, and is actively installing fiber to the community of Mountain Grove.
When discussing the project, MGW’s president Craig Smith stated, “It’s hard to believe that Mountain Grove was one of the first places my dad installed telephone service. That was back when they pulled the wires over the mountain with mules, and now we’re installing fiber optic cable over the mountain. It’s very exciting for us and for the community.”
Mountain Grove is one of many telephone exchanges in MGW’s service territory and is the only remaining exchange yet to be connected to their fiber network - which is why the project is titled ‘One More to Go’. According to Robert Huff, Strategic Planning Director at MGW, “The Mountain Grove area could be considered one of the more remote areas of Virginia and that exchange is non-contiguous with the rest of MGW’s service territory, so getting fiber there was a multi-year, 13-mile fiber project. It took time to get the permits from the Forest Service and other agencies to get over the mountain, but it was also important to us that we installed the fiber underground.” Underground installation is much more costly and takes more time than installing the fiber on poles. However, the fiber will not be susceptible to the inevitable fallen tree, ice, or other weather-related outages like aerial cable.
The final phase of construction is underway, and the MGW fiber installation crew is currently on the home stretch as they install cable down the western side of the mountain. Residents of the Mountain Grove area can now begin signing up for new high-speed internet and phone packages. Craig Smith, President of MGW, will attend a meeting at the Mountain Grove Fire Department in early January to provide an update to area residents and answer questions about the fiber project.
