(Photo: Wikimedia)

Today Time Warner Cable announced that the company expects to invest $25 million to expand its fiber optic network in both "established and emerging" business sectors around New York City. Many of the areas highlighted in today's announcement happen to coincide with burgeoning tech hubs.

In a press release to Betabeat, Time Warner said it would extend its broadband capabilities in "the World Trade Center, the Flatiron District, all areas of Midtown and throughout the Financial District," in Manhattan. In addition to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Time Warner is also upgrading fiber in the "Brooklyn Tech Triangle, the Brooklyn Army Terminal and Industry City." Long Island City in Queens, the future home to Shapeways 3D-printing factory, will also benefit from the effort.

The investment is part of a deal with the city that was still being hammered out in June when Mayor Bloomberg announced his big plan to improve broadband. At the time, Time Warner was named in the ConnectNYC facet of the mayor's plan, which focused on wiring previously underserved areas and improving connectivity in commercial and industrial buildings.

Today's announcement, for example, was made at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, home to Carnegie Mellon's tech campus initiative, where Time Warner is finishing up "a multi-million dollar investment to provide fiber-based solutions to tenants of the 300-acre business complex."

But Time Warner isn't the only company the city has partnered with, as the Wall Street Journal reports, especially when it comes to residential initiatives.

The city also has tech agreements with Verizon Communications Inc., Cablevision Systems Corp. and AT&T Inc. Companies are laying fiber, providing wireless hot spots in parks and opening learning labs that give residents access to computers.

Time Warner itself is opening a "state-of-the-art" Learning Lab in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, "located inside the massive complex and accessible to the public." Good news for the long-neglected residents of the three neighboring housing projects, we hope.

(Photo: Brooklyn Tech Triangle)

The Brooklyn Tech Triangle already thinks it's bigger and better than Manhattan, and now they're getting a transportation upgrade to help them prove it.

The triangle--which includes Downtown Brooklyn, DUMBO and the Brooklyn Navy Yard--is getting its very own dedicated bus route, according to a press release issued today by New York state senator Daniel Squadron.

Senator Squadron and MTA stakeholders will plan the new route, which is set to roll out in 2013. "Brooklyn's tech industry is changing the face of New York -- and now, we'll have a bus route that will allow the booming Tech Triangle to continue to grow and innovate," Senator Squadron stated in the release.

And here we thought most startup kids were fiercely loyal to the ice cream-wielding Uber team.

WTH is a tech engine? (brooklyntechtriangle.com)

Looks like DUMBO isn't the only neighborhood eager to flaunt its tech prowess. According to a new site launched last week, DUMBO is just one 'hood that's part of the "Brooklyn Tech Triangle," which also includes downtown Brooklyn and the Navy Yard. A local coalition from each neighborhood has been tapped to represent its district in the Brooklyn Tech Triangle initiative, which seeks to establish the area as an innovative and welcoming place for tech firms.

According to a recent report commissioned by the initiative's three main partners, the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, DUMBO Improvement District and the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation:

The Brooklyn Tech Triangle, is currently home to more than 500 creative companies in more than 1.7 million square feet of space.  By 2015 the area is expected to exceed more than 600 firms requiring 3.1 million square feet...Brooklyn has experienced greater and faster growth in the tech and creative sectors than New York City as a whole from 2007 to 2011.  Brooklyn has seen annual average growth of 4.9 percent, compared to -1.4 percent for NYC.

The Brooklyn Tech Triangle initiative intends to use the survey's findings to better understand and address the needs of the area, so that they may "create an area-wide master plan that examines the viability of the tech sector in Downtown Brooklyn, DUMBO and the Navy Yard, the reuse of certain real estate assets to accommodate growth and bolster Downtown Brooklyn as a destination for creative companies."

Man, the city is really on its A-game this week. The initiative site's launch, as well as the survey's findings, dovetail nicely with today's announcement that downtown Brooklyn will become the home of a new NYU-sponsored Center for Urban Science and Progress. Of course, it's important to maintain a healthy dose of skepticism, since it's obviously in the best interest of both politicians and real estate developers to make it look like this is indeed a movement and not just spillover from digital DUMBO.

So, "Brooklyn, start your tech engines" the website urges (ugh): looks like the tech turf wars have only just begun.

Check out the Brooklyn Tech Triangle initiative's infographic below.

(brooklyntechtriangle.com)