The City of Philadelphia has inspired much discussion after its decision to go ahead with a city-wide wireless plan. Recently, the city council approved a plan to implement, which means they are going ahead with the city-wide wireless system. One of their prime objectives was to provide an infrastructure for economic growth. But they also wanted to make low cost or free wireless high speed internet available to the poorer areas of the city. Moreover, they didn't want the city to be providing and supporting the service, and indeed wanted the city to remain "cost neutral" on the program. These were challenging criteria, and the city adopted an outsourcing approach and did a considerable amount of studying to come up with a business model for all the players that could work. Their business plan is at the link below. They identified several business models (pages 30 etc. in the document) and the sponsoring committee recommended a hybrid plan that combined a "non-profit" and a "cooperative wholesale" approach. It makes an interesting study in municipal government and business working together. http://www.phila.gov/wireless/pdfs/Wireless-Phila-Business-Plan-040305-1245pm.pdf