The pain of statistics means that no matter how good a target for coverage
or speed has been set, unless it is really 100% there will be those still
missing out. Step forward the villages of Downe, Cudham, Keston and Chelsfield
just inside the south east corner of the M25 and part of the London Borough of
Bromley rather than Kent.
Local press coverage of a campaign to bring
superfast connectivity to the around 3,000 residents tells us that Bromley
Council has refused to match fund the £586,000 of funding that has been put on
the table by Westminster. While the decision seems harsh, a lot depends on what
the council felt it would have to cut back on and coverage for Bromley as a
whole is outstanding with 95% able to access a superfast service, and the 1.7%
under 15 Mbps seems to pretty much comprise of these villages.
| thinkbroadband calculation of current fibre, superfast and new USO broadband coverage in London Borough of Bromley and the Orpington Constituency – 13th April 2015 |
|||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Council Area | % fibre based | % superfast (>30 Mbps) | % cable | % Openreach FTTP | % Under 2 Mbps USC | % Under 5 Mbps (new USO) | % Under 15 Mbps |
| Bromley London Borough | 95.9% | 95% | 84.7% | 0% | 0.6% | 1.8% | 4.1% |
| Orpington Constituency held by CON | 94.6% | 92.8% | 81.9% | 0% | 1.1% | 3.6% | 7% |
The difference between the Bromley council footprint and the Orpington
constituency relects better the local picture. The cabinets that are missing
out on FTTC appear to be cabinet 42 (Orpington), cabinet 23 (Farnborough), cabs
9 and 22 (Biggin Hill) and cab 6 (Knockholt), they all have a more dispersed
set of postcodes connected to them, meaning that while a good number would get
superfast from a VDSL2 upgrade, the upgrades would leave significant numbers of
premises missing out or only getting marginally faster speeds than the 1 to 5
Mbps that seem possible now. In effect it is easy to see why these cabinets
missed out on the commercial roll-out, and even in a phase 1 BDUK project they
might have missed out.
As things stand until the Government (which of course may change in a few
weeks) provide funding to actually go beyond the 95% figure we will keep
hearing from areas like this. One option might be for small and medium
businesses in the area to pool their £3,000
connection vouchers and fund the build of a fibre cabinet, or maybe a
FTTH/FTTP roll-out. If the estimate of 1,000 businesses affected is correct
then plenty of scope to build up a funding scheme away from Bromley
council.
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These are affluent villages, therefore, the contribution that the residents make in council tax must be quite considerable. They are probably paying more tax than the services provided to them cost.
For Bromley Council to fail to fund their superfast broadband is totally unjustifiable and goes against everything that the BDUK scheme was set up to provide.
Bromley has no BDUK funding.
No BDUK1 funding but the article says that £586K government funding is available. It’s a shame that no such funding appears to be available for other London not spots or for those on EO lines.
@ribble
No BDUK funding but the sentiment is the same.
Central government cash matched by local authority cash.
If you let things slip and standards fall a task is never completed!
@chilting Really
vouchers cannot be used to fund cabinets –that against state aid rules — connection vouherts are to enable cabs — nto fund infrastrcuture
the areas in question are in london and there is no BDUK money spend in london
Hi Andrew Staff
The two Cabs 9 and 12 on Biggin Exchange do they have customers that are over the Surrey border that will not get the 15 meg target.
chilting – I very much doubt that. Council tax is banded, it’s based on a formula. It doesn’t work the way you think it does. Also, the council tax receipts will account for at most, about 20% of the total receipts of the council that are needed to provide the services.
The point is that if superfast targets start slipping we will end up with “Superfast Not Spots”.
The aim of giving the whole country Superfast Broadband must continue to be a priority to the point that the very final 0.5%, or less, have to rely on satellite.
@chilting and it is continuing, Bromley looked at their current 95% coverage and probably decided to do no more, but once funding for final 5% appears then things will change, or Virgin Media expansion may have covered a few more areas as they expand their network on the fringes.
Spot the DSLAM cabinet
http://goo.gl/maps/ML1t3
The DSLAM cabinet is even listed on the infinity checker for TN16 3AD postcode as a location. But the area shows as under review…
under review — means is waiting for funding in this case its not part of commercial prgramme, no budk so waiting for other form of funding
That cab is commercial not BDUK and is already stood. Just not completed
may hav hit high cost of power / spine so will be stuck until it can be unstuck