The idea
5% of the UK isn’t covered by any existing fibre broadband rollout plans.
That includes 130 households and a nursery school near Gladstone Park, none of whom can get superfast fibre broadband.
That's really frustrating, especially since all of the other households around us, even ones on the other side of the street, can all get fibre.
Standard broadband just doesn't cut it these days, and for some of us the speeds are so poor that we're being left behind in the technical revolution which is permeating all our everyday lives.
The lack of fibre broadband could even be detrimental to the value of our homes, according to research.
BT Openreach won't upgrade our street cabinet to fibre, as it's not commercial for them with just 130 households covered, so we're going to enter into a community fibre partnership with them to co-fund the upgrade.
The good news is that one of the affected properties is a school, so BT provide a grant for 75% of the cost. We just need to fund the rest.
What we'll deliver
- Upgrade our local street cabinet to be fibre-enabled
- Enable all of us to choose a fibre broadband package from any provider we like
- Bring our internet connections into the 21st century
Why it's a great idea
We’ve all got more and more internet connected devices in our homes, such as mobile phones, tablets, laptops, Smart TVs, Sky+ boxes, Kindles, and more.
With all of these devices competing for internet bandwidth, especially in shared households, standard broadband is fast becoming a bottleneck.
If you’ve ever experienced slow internet because someone in your house is watching a movie in HD on Netflix or BBC iPlayer, superfast broadband is the solution.
Superfast broadband also tends to be more reliable than standard broadband, because it uses mainly fibre optic cables instead of old-fashioned copper.
Broadband speeds are now a key factor in the decision making process for many buyers and tenants. The big property websites all list likely broadband speeds for properties, and research shows
that people would be prepared to pay more for a home if it had good broadband.
Steps to get it done
- Confirmed costing from BT Openreach
