Rank: 53
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)
Lake of the Woods County: Big leap in last year
Lake of the Woods County ranks 53 (up six points) for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 78.82 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 696 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $6.5 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 |
| Lake of the Woods | 1.9 | 3,286 | 78.82 | 696 | 6472800 |
Lake of the Woods has been working on broadband for several years. They were a Blandin Broadband Community. In 2019, Wikstrom Telephone received a Border to Border award and they saw a big increase in access. In December 2022, Wikstrom received another award of $665,699 to serve rural sparsely populated areas in Kittson, Lake of the Woods, & Marshall in far NW Minnesota, passing 150 home, business, and farm locations.
Lake of the Woods continues to make incremental improvements but with limited engagement in the last few years and coverage hovering before 80 percent, they are not ranked as a red county.
Broadband Access:
| 2023 | 2022 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | ||
| 100/20 (2026 goal) | 78.82 | 74.26 | 74.31 | 53.93 | 50.47 | 0 | |
| 25/3 (2022 goal) | 85.45 | 74.6 | 74.55 | 57.42 | 50.47 | 50.61 |
Grants:
- 2022: Wikstrom Telephone Co. Inc, $665,699.00 (to serve Beltrami, Kittson, Lake of the Woods, Marshall)
- 2016 – SJOBERG’S INC. ROSEAU AND LAKE OF THE WOODS COUNTIES — GRANT: $354,740
- 2016 – WIKSTROM TELEPHONE COMPANY WIKTEL NW MN – GRANT: $950,823
- 2019: Wikstrom Telephone – Wiktel NW MN Broadband Project – GRANT $1,151,526
Find more articles on broadband in Lake of the Woods County (http://tinyurl.com/gpfu7dd)
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.
