Bristol, Va., a community of 18,000 residents in southwest Virginia, is home to the Bristol Motor Speedway for NASCAR events and the Country Music Alliance Museum. The city is one of the first entities in the nation to offer voice, data and video to residents via fiber-to-the-premise (FTTP) technology. All this was made possible by Bristol Virginia Utilities’ (BVU) 800-mile and growing broadband network run by the utility’s OptiNet division. The network has been funded with revenue bonds and grants from the Virginia Tobacco Commission’s technology committee.