EarthLink is pulling the plug on its troubled wireless high-speed Internet network in Philadelphia, once touted as a model for how big cities should deploy Wi-Fi.

EarthLink, which once pinned its future on municipal networks such as Philadelphia’s following rapid declines in its dial-up Internet access business, said Tuesday that it could not find a buyer for the $17 million network and that talks to give it to either the city or a nonprofit organization had failed.