Maybe a little of topic, but here goes....

I am interesting in creating a private wide area network. The network will cover an area of about 1 mile in diameter (line of sight). It must be able to support a max of 50 users, some with light physical obstruction (trees, walls), but most user have a clear line of sight.

The server would be at the center of of star formation, the main access point. The question at hand is how to extend the range of the current wireless technology so that users within the 1 mile circle could have wireless access of maybe 10 mbps (at leat 1 mbps) data transfer.

Its seems that this would be pretty difficult, since most wireless lan cards and wireless access points are pretty limited in range and power. I thought maybe it would be possible to use about 5 or 6 distributed access points with range extenders. Each distributed access point would have about 10 users locally. Each of these local access points must have a connection with the main access point, the server.

A major limiting factor is cost. Running fiber is almost impossible.

I am not sure if this is even possible, my knowledge of wireless is very limited.

Any ideas on where to start looking at hardware that may be capable of meeting these requirements..., anyone???

Thanks