As many as 2 million people are expected to flood the nation’s capital Tuesday for President-elect Barack Obama’s inauguration ceremony.
The average U.S. mobile subscriber sends and receives more text messages than telephone calls, according to research released Monday by Nielsen Mobile.
During the second quarter of 2008, an average U.S. mobile subscriber placed or received 204 phone calls each month. In comparison, the average mobile customer sent or received 357 text messages per month — a 450 percent increase over the number of text messages circulated monthly during the same period in 2006.
While the first thing they’ll want to do is catch a glimpse of the 44th U.S. president, probably the next will be to text message everyone they know a photo of Obama or a few words about the experience. That’s a lot of mobile device use in and around Washington.
“Given the demographic that’s associated with Obama — the 18-year-old to 34-year-old crowd — that’s the largest demographic for text messaging,” said Mark Titus, senior director of product management for Annapolis-based TeleCommunications Systems. “I expect they’ll be sending a lot of text messages.”
To meet the increased demand, wireless companies are working to boost and optimize their network capacities in and around Washington.
“For months, wireless carriers have been working hard to prepare for what could be an unprecedented inauguration week,” said Steve Largent, president and chief executive of CTIA, The Wireless Association. “Companies are going to extraordinary lengths, investing significant amounts of time and money, and are doing everything within their power to boost network capacities in Washington for this historic event.”
All the major wireless companies — Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile — are adding significant power to their cell sites in and around the city to meet the spike in demand. The carriers are also deploying mobile cell sites in vans or trucks to accommodate changes in demand for service at different locations in the city.
Largent warned that unusually large crowds of people will cause some service delays. The wireless industry has experience handling larger events, such as New Year’s Eve in New York City’s Times Square or the recent national political conventions, where mobile device traffic jumps dramatically in a small area.
“Think of a wireless network like a highway. Even though we’re building more lanes, if millions of people jump on the road at the same time, there could be a traffic jam,” Largent said. “For this reason, we want to remind inaugural event attendees to do their part in decreasing network demand by texting instead of placing voice calls, and holding off on sending cell phone pictures or video until after the events are over.”
But if the carriers have properly planned for the surge in demand, service shouldn’t be greatly disrupted, Titus said.
“The wireless carriers are very sensitive to the increased demand for capacity,” Titus said. “I think the user will hardly see any change in service.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
