Cablevision has reached out to us to note that their effort to provide free Wi-Fi to all of their broadband subscribers is moving along. After lighting up a massive swath of Long Island in September, the company says they've activated high traffic areas of Connecticut -- as well as in Westchester/Dutchess counties in NY. The project was announced last May, will take roughly two years to complete, and will cost Cablevision about $100 per customer (Cablevision has 3.1 million cable customers, 2.4 million of whom have broadband). The service offers symmetrical 1.5Mbps speeds, according to Cablevision.

The move helps Cablevision differentiate themselves from FiOS across their footprint. You might recall that Verizon once offered free Wi-Fi in Manhattan, but scrapped the project back in 2005 because they feared it cannibalized the sale of their (then) $80 EVDO service. Cablevision COO Tom Rutledge has stated that Wi-Fi and Cablevision's planned DOCSIS 3.0 deployment combined will cost roughly about $315 million.

According to Cablevision, this is already the "largest and most advanced consumer Wi-Fi network in the nation, based on geographic coverage." The company also says they have more than doubled the size of its activated Optimum Wi-Fi service area just since its initial deployment update early last month. According to users in Cablevision markets, the company is deploying BelAir 100S Strand Mounted Wireless Multi-service Nodes and Cisco Aironet 1500 Series mesh access points on utility poles.

The company offers a new website to map Wi-Fi progress.