Cable upgrade, FTTC or community fibre?

Hi

In the village of Selling near to me there is no/poor broadband. KCC are trying to attract a potential provider to supply broadband by offering a grant however ALL post codes in the village would need to be covered. This will not be possible with wireless due to the trees, landscape and spread of the village. It would be nice to see BT bring FTTC to the village but we all know that won't happen! Especially as the village is spread across the boarders or 2 exchanges and several cabinets.

So where to go from here? As I see it the village could be left without any improvement in broadband unless cables are upgraded or FTTC is installed, both of which are very unlikely to happen!

The only other option might be to ditch BT and install a fibre optic network through the sewers but that'll cost a hell of a lot of money just to supply 327 houses and 17 businesses!

Details of the village and the request from KCC can be found at:- http://www.kent.gov.uk/business/broadband-service.htm

Any comments or help is much appreciated!

Tim

Edited by 5km (Sat 11-Jul-09 11:08:06)

it's a tender, so Openreach could bid for £50k to install FTTC if they wished (though there may be State Aid implications if it were Openreach).

The tender requires a 2M service for all which from what you say may result in no tenders being received other than from satellite providers who could offer individual and shared wi-fi solutions as appropriate.

86 of the properties already have >=2M according to the document, so 26% don't need any effort.

Is there a Kent County Council network conneciton (eg a school) available for backhaul ?

I might be reading this wrong but the postcode / speed table on the KCC web site shows the expected speed from the BT Postcode checker that is often cautious.

Do you know anyone in that area? (History is telling me your from that area originally) If so can you source some line stats?
It might be as simple as just improving peoples wiring rather than offering a new service from the ground up.

I have a family member over 5km from the exchange and they synced at 488/488, removing the ring wire brought this up to 17xx/488
Next time I visit I might remove a few more unused extensions and see if further improvement is made.

Yes the school, Selling C.E Primary has a fibre, part of the Kentish MAN network.

I am indeed from the area and moved away a couple of years ago partly due to the lack of broadband.

Most already know about removing the internal wiring, less know about the ring wire however the distance is more than you would expect due partly to the ye olde exchange and thus poor routing of the lines.

At my parents house in the village the connection speed is 1664/448k using a speedtouch 585 with a 3dB SNR margin. Ring wire and extensions have also been removed. I was told a few years ago that the line is 10.62KM long and by no means the longest in the village!

Saying that the checker is cautious does not really help the situation. Some people in the village have been paying for broadband that is very slow and doesn't work in the evenings/summer.

From my experience of the area I would say that checker is quite accurate with only room for a small improvement in speed for some that haven't already fitted a master socket filter.

Some people have simply had enough of BT and want the wires removed from the village and some one else to provide the phone and broadband services! It will be hard persuading some residents that improvements can be made to their current service.

Tim

Thats fair enough, just trying to think of a possible quick fix that might be of use, but it does look like FTTC would be the best option as this cuts the loop length down sharply.

Though have a look at these people - http://www.rutlandtelecom.co.uk/FAQ/rural-national.html

They might be able to assist.

Edited by bookey (Tue 14-Jul-09 15:28:38)

I think if you can get 300 prenises involved then together with a grant of some kind from the government you can get a fibre line and it distributed some how within the vilage via cabling or wireless broadcast. No idea on cost but you'd be looking at 100k plus a year id imagine. that said, if all houses in the vilage took a slice of the pie, it would cost £300 a year each. the businesses could pay £500 for the same service, but with an added cost for profit of managing the thing.

I dunno, but a fibre line is definately something you'll need for a project that big.

Reading your other post, it seems that there is already fibre to the village and lighting up cores is relatively easy - but there is a cost.

What is needed is for someone to provision and install a series of WiFi or similar base stations around the village with directional microwave links between them. It is a fairly easy task but will be expensive.

Then you hit the annual maintenance , management and rental costs. Who would pay those? Would those homes that already have 2Mbit be willing to give it up and buy from the local network? Possibly not as it may cost more and if they are not willing to then the cost to others will increase.

An initial grant is fine but the ongoing costs will be the problem.

One odd question though why are KCC doing this now when a 2mbit USO is 2 years away.

By the time the USO is pushed through and objections overcome it will be longer than 2 years and then the telcos will have a compliance period where they need to demonstrate they are moving towards meeting the USO. So it could be nearer 5 years than 2.

it would cost £300 a year each

ie £25 per month. How many will pay that ? Going to a meeting to complain is one thing, stumping up a £250 install fee and £25/month is another. Broadband is free, innit ?