In a recent article published Monday, May 11, 1998, in the San Jose Mercury News, staff writer Deborah Kong wrote that a Silicon Valley apartment complex which lured tech-savvy tenants with the promise of state-of-the-art high-speed Internet connections has been lost in cyber-space.

Instead of finding an HOV lane on the Information superhighway, tenants instead are stuck in traffic.

The Toscana Apartments in Sunnyvale were built to offer residents ultrafast T-1 lines, known to be up to 50 times faster than ordinary computer modems. But some residents have run into nothing but trouble, blaming the apartment owners San Jose-based Bay Apartment Communities for attempting to operate a high-speed telecommunications network it was unable to understand or service.

One resident was quoted as saying,``It was just very frustrating. I think they greatly underestimated the market. They're in Silicon Valley and they're selling them to upwardly mobile technology professionals and they definitely underestimated what we were demanding from the service.''

Now the company is acknowledging that the kinks in the system are due to the fact that it is brand-new technology and is not charging residents for the service until improvements are made.

Bay has turned to Pacific Bell Internet, which will serve as the apartments' Internet service provider, and look at improving Toscana's system.

Knowing that help is on the way, Bay is planning to open four other complexes with similar high-tech features by summer of next year.

"Everyone who is building today is looking at somehow incorporating high-speed Internet access,'' said Terry Feinberg, executive director of the Tri-County Apartment Association, which represents Santa Clara, San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties.

Although Silicon Valley is ahead of most other areas of the nation, some builders in New York and other urban, high-tech pockets have opened similarly plugged-in apartments.

Published: June 4, 1998

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