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Last updated: Tuesday, October 28, 2008

The focus at The Greenbrier, a national historic landmark established in 1778, has always been on providing luxury in an historic setting, but its technology services have lagged over the years. Now, the resort, nestled in the Allegheny Mountains in White Sulphur Springs, W.V., has launched a program designed to ensure that its technological capabilities are on par with its charm and its heritage. The first effort under this program has been to deploy an in-building wireless solution that supports multiple cellular carriers, eliminates coverage holes in public and “back-of-the-house” areas, and upgrades wireless voice and data services. Mike Keatley, IT director at The Greenbrier, knew the resort would be closed for general renovations during the first quarter of 2007. so he decided it would be an ideal time to upgrade cellular coverage. The resort’s managers had been using BlackBerry 8330 smart phones and other employees had been given voice phones of various brands from U.S. Cellular. Managers were offered access to e-mail and calendaring services via Exchange Server and BlackBerry servers in the resort’s data center, but cellular coverage was so spotty that these employees were not taking full advantage of these services. Coverage for guests tailed off when they were in areas such as the spa, indoor pool, or conference and exhibition center. Part of The Greenbrier’s charm is its lush green setting on 6,500 acres in West Virginia, but that was also part of the problem. The resort is located in a rural area where the nearest cell towers are about three miles away. Outdoors and in the 700 guest rooms, guests and workers got adequate coverage from AT&T, Sprint, U.S. Cellular and Verizon, but the sloping site made getting a signal on the lower, eastern side of the structure difficult. This area houses facilities such as the indoor pool,…

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Case Study: Historic Resort Fixes Wireless Gap

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