Rank: 67
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)
Koochiching County: incremental increases
Koochiching County ranks 67 (down 4 points) for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 73.83 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 1818 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $16.9 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.
| County | Residential Location Density | number of residential locations | ≥ 100 Mbps Download/20 Mbps Upload Speeds | unserved households | Cost to close gap |
| Koochiching | 2.2 | 6,948 | 73.83 | 1818 | 16907400 |
Koochiching County has been hovering around 73 percent coverage for a while now. In 2023, Koochiching County was awarded a $77,300 Border to Border grant to serve 13 businesses along an established trucking route that is heavily used to connect Highway 53 and Highway 11 E through a partnership with Midco.
Hopefully that partnership will start a momentum toward improvement but at this point, Koochiching might need to see more demonstration of effort before losing the red ranking.
| 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | |
| 100/20 (2026 goal) | 73.83 | 72.3 | 72.85 | 68.6 | 73.41 | 73.44 | 68.55 |
| 25/3 (2022 goal) | 76.37 | 75.8 | 80.2 | 81.57 | 81.22 | 73.5 | 68.6 |
Grants
- 2023: Koochiching County – Koochiching County International Falls Economic Development – GRANT $77,300
- 2015 – Midcontinent Little Fork Middle Mile – Grant award: $277,448
- Paul Bunyan Communications – North Central Minnesota Fiber Project– GRANT $2,562,916
Checklist:
- Find more articles on broadband in Koochiching. (http://tinyurl.com/gom8mqy)
I am doing the annual look at broadband in each county – based on maps from the Office of Broadband Development and news gathered from the last year. I’m looking at progress toward the 2022 (25 Mbps down and 3 Mbps up) and 2026 (100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up) and will code each:
- Red (yikes)
- Yellow (warning)
- Green (good shape)
The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.
