Full-fibre broadband rollout by County Broadband
Revealed: 19 more villages in Constable Country added to gigabit-capable full-fibre broadband rollout by County Broadband
Press Release from County Broadband.
Around 20,000 rural homes and businesses in Constable Country have been earmarked to get full-fibre broadband built in their village and receive some of the fastest and most reliable connections in the UK, community broadband provider County Broadband has announced.
Nineteen villages on the Suffolk/Essex border including East Bergholt, Capel St Mary and Brantham have been added to County Broadband’s rollout of Hyperfast full-fibre broadband.
Full-fibre networks deliver fibre cables directly into homes and businesses, replacing existing Superfast connections which are often promoted as fibre but rely on slow copper cables which date back to the Victorians and cannot be upgraded to support growing data demands.
The new FTTP (fibre-to-the-premises) networks provide speeds of 1,000Mbps to each property – about 11 times faster than the UK average. What’s more they can be upgraded to over 10,000Mbps when the need arises. FTTP infrastructure also provides far greater reliability as they have no copper in the network.
County Broadband is engaging with over 150 villages in East Anglia and the 19 villages in South Suffolk added to its rollout are: Bentley, Brantham, Capel St. Mary, Copdock and Washbrook, East Bergholt, Higham, Holton St. Mary, Layham, Leavenheath, Nayland-with-Wissington, Polstead, Raydon, Stoke-by-Nayland, Stratford St. Mary, and Wenham Magna.
James Salmon, Director of Sales and New Territories at County Broadband, said: “The pandemic has shown just how crucial having fast and reliable internet has become, and while people might have been happy with 40 to 50Mbps speeds yesterday, that is no longer sufficient today, let alone next year. Our increasing internet consumption continues to grow and as more speed is available more technology will use it.
“The harsh reality, especially in rural areas, is that broadband supplied over copper cables is simply too slow, too unreliable and it seriously limits what people can do – from home entertainment to flexi and home working.
“Installing new infrastructure on this scale is a complex task, requiring significant planning and can take time to deliver. It involves the coordination of highways, landowners, civils works and advanced fibre optic engineering. Designing and building this multi-million-pound rural infrastructure takes around 12-18 months, meaning the full-fibre networks could be live by Christmas 2022.
“We look forward to engaging with each community, whether that’s via webinars or in person, to provide further details about our dedicated plans and how people can register their interest online.”
Residents can find out if they are in the rollout area by visiting www.countybroadband.co.uk.
County Broadband officials are set to hold public meetings and online events for each village over the coming months to explain the rollout and answer questions.
A representative from County Broadband will be attending our next Parish Council meeting on Thursday 2nd September to briefly explain the scheme to residents
- County Broadband is a specialist rural broadband provider based in East Anglia.
- In 2018, County Broadband received £46 million funding from Aviva Investors to offer fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) Hyperfast broadband to select villages across the East of England.
- FTTP is the installation of fibre optic cables directly into premises and offers speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps (1 Gigabit). This is significantly faster than the more commonly used fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) technology in which fibre cables are sent to local street-side cabinets and then distributed through existing old copper cabling to each premise.
- For more information, visit www.countybroadbandfibre.co.uk or follow @CountyBroadband on Twitter
Broadband speed definitions. Broadband.co.uk defines the following services:
- High Speed = broadband up to 24Mbps
- Superfast = Broadband up to 80Mbps
- Ultrafast = speeds of 100Mbps up to 500Mbps
- Hyperfast = speeds of 500Mbps or more
Referenced here: https://www.broadband.co.uk/guides/ultrafast-and-hyperfast-broadband/