REGIONAL VIEW shenandoah valley


Shentel installs residential fiber optic across valley by Mason Adams


ing more competition among broadband providers. Edinburg-based Shenan-


A


doah Telecommunications Co., or Shentel, founded more than a century ago by farmers seeking improved telecommu- nications services for their rural communities, is still focused on that mission, though these days it’s a little more high-tech than it was in the days of candlestick telephones. Shentel is laying fiber- optic lines for residences in Harrisonburg, Staunton, Winchester, Front Royal, Salem and Lynchburg. The company start ed offering residential fiber-optic service in a handful of Harrisonburg neighborhoods in October, with Staunton following in the first quarter of 2020. Shentel expects to begin offering service in the other cities later in 2020. “This is huge for the city


and, more importantly, for the citizens to be able to have


FOR THE RECORD


After years of work and numerous setbacks, it looks as though the Claudius Crozet Blue Ridge Tunnel in Afton will be complete in 2020. Although the project was initiated in 2001, groundbreaking didn’t take place until 2014. Despite financial roadblocks over the years, the last of three phases is set to be complete by June 30, the senior project manager said. The tunnel was designed by Crozet, a French engineer, and constructed in the 1850s. It was open for almost 100 years servicing the Virginia Central Railroad, which became the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway, and closed in 1944. The current project to reopen the tunnel cost about $5.75 million, paid mostly with state grants. (The News & Advance)


Photo by Norm Shafer


growing number of Shenandoah Valley communities are see-


"This is huge for the city," says Staunton Chief Technology Offi cer Kurt Plowman.


Shentel reached franchise


competitive choices now in broadband services,” says Kurt Plowman, Staunton’s chief technology officer. Shentel, which employs 1,000 people and sees about $600 million in annual revenues, is expanding upon a fiber backbone that extends along Interstate 81. “We had a new chief


operating officer, David Heimbach, come in about 18 months ago,” says Chris Kyle, Shentel’s vice president of regulatory affairs. “He started looking at all these capabili- ties in this area and started a conversation as to why we weren’t taking what we were


Gov. Ralph Northam’s proposed 2020 state budget calls for $7.4 million in supplemental funding for Lord Fairfax Com- munity College, earmarked for the 40,000-square-foot Hazel Hall science, engineering and health professions building on the Fauquier campus. Hazel Hall was originally funded at $15 million, but Richmond general contractor Kjellstrom & Lee Construction bid $20 million for the total cost for the project as designed by Charlottesville-based Grimm and Parker Architecture Inc. The extra funding from the state will be used to make up that gap in funding, allowing the project to move forward. Work on the project could begin as early as July 1. (The Northern Virginia Daily)


proficient in and rolling it out to a residential market. We had to spin up that expertise — it uses the same technology but some different business principles. That was the nexus of what we have been doing.” Harrisonburg and


Staunton made sense as places to begin expansion into the residential market. “We wanted to be part of


the growth that Staunton is creating,” Kyle says. “Broad- band can be one important piece of that. We were seeing all the new businesses along U.S. 250. Clearly, we felt like we were adjacent and in that area already.”


Home to a flight program that has taught teenagers to fly since 1985, Randolph-Macon Academy in Front Royal has hired a new director of unmanned flight operations to oversee its drone curriculum. Brian J. Kelly is the founder and CEO of National Drone Services and laid the groundwork for a drone program at the academy in late December. Students will get hands-on training flying drones. After a three-week course in January, the school will offer a summer course and a full range of drone classes in the next school year. (Royal Examiner)


The Winchester School Board is requesting $1.5 million from the Winchester City Council to complete the Emil and Grace Shihadeh Innovation


www.VirginiaBusiness.com


agreements with Staunton in 2018 to install fiber optic lines, marketed as Glo Fiber, in the city. Last May, the city also granted Shentel a franchise for video services, providing customers with an alternative to Comcast. The fiber build will take years, but Kyle says the service gets “turned up” — Shentel’s term for coming online — as each neighborhood is completed. Previously, “if people wanted a choice in TV service and didn’t like Comcast, they had to go to a satellite provider or streaming service,” Plowman says. “Up until last year, we didn’t think anyone would offer competition.”


Customers probably won’t


see much of a change in prices for cable television and internet, but Plowman is glad city resi- dents are getting more choices. “I’m excited also because


we’ve got increased competi- tion,” Plowman says. “It makes Staunton even more of a cool place to live.”


Center, which is estimated to cost $17.2 million, more than $2 million than currently available funding. City Council already agreed to provide $13.2 million in funds in bonds, in addition to state funds and dona- tions, to start the vocational center in the former John Kerr Elementary School on Jefferson Street. Renova- tions to the building have started, and the center, a joint venture by the city’s public schools and Lord Fairfax Community College, will house three academies focusing on health professions, information technology and professional skills. It is expected to open in fall 2021. (The Winchester Star)


Staunton could eventually get increased passenger rail service under a multipart deal announced


in December between CSX Trans- portation and the state. Under terms of the $3.7 billion agree- ment announced by Gov. Ralph Northam, the state would acquire CSX’s North Mountain subdivision through Staunton, with an eye toward eventually creating east- west passenger service linking Roanoke, Richmond and Norfolk. That local segment is owned by CSX and operated by the Buckingham Branch Railroad. The 186-mile route carries Buckingham Branch local freight trains, six Amtrak passenger trains a week, and empty CSX coal trains headed toward West Virginia. The deal is expected to be finalized in 2020, and the timetable for the east-west corridor was not specified in the announcement. (News Leader)


VIRGINIA BUSINESS | 13


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