Fibre Rollout in Derby?

Hi all. Firstly I'd like to say that I've been using this site for a few weeks now and have found it to be very interesting and informative so thank you to all involved.

I was wondering if somebody who is in the know may be able to shed any light on what the current situation is regarding the fibre rollout in Derby City Centre. Quite a bit of work took place around 2-3 years ago, then all of a sudden things seemed to grind to a halt. About half of the cabinets have been fibre enabled for years, whereas many others located very close by, and with perhaps a greater market for customers, haven't been touched.

Openreach's "Where and When" checker suddenly stopped showing that it was coming soon and started showing "Under Review" for the relevant locations. I've attempted to make contact with them on several occasions but keep getting met with the same copy and paste response of "It's on hold awaiting further planning".

I can't quite understand why some areas have been enabled for years and others have been neglected. There doesn't seem to be any pattern regarding which areas have received upgrades. If you were to walk from one end of the city to the other, you would end up going from a fibre enabled street, to a non-enabled one, to an enabled one and so on.

Virgin serve the majority of the city too, but annoyingly I happen to be located in the 2% that is currently not served by Virgin or BT fibre. After speaking to Virgin they've said they're happy to extend the cable to me from the adjacent street if I'm happy to pay them £5000!!!

The council don't seem to be interested in providing any info either. Looking at their Lightspeed Derby website it appears that it hasn't been updated in the last 3 years!

If there's anyone who has any info at all, either on the city's situation as a whole, or the outlook for my location personally, it would be very much appreciated.

My particular location is DE1 3NZ and I am served by cabinet 13.

Thank you in advance.

I just took a look and can see that the fibre rollout for your Exchange Derby (EMDRRBB) was upgraded by the commercial rollout and it seems that Cabinets 20, 44 and 105 were done this year it seems, I cannot see anything else down for fibre in the regular places.

However looking at the old NGA Documents for 2011 I can see that DE1 3NZ is connected to Cabinet 13 and was and maybe still down for FTTP as part of the 66% commercial project which was due to be done in phase 7a back in 2011-2013 sadly the commercial rollout for FTTP all got delayed to do all the BDUK work, my FTTP was also put on hold and has only started to have the install finished.

Things change all the time, so this information may or may not be correct now.

I have noticed that only the FTTC have been done and some of those was originally down for FTTP.

I can see that back in 2011 the following cabinets was due to be upgraded to FTTP along with many others:
13, 31, 33, 36, 38, 63, 66, 84, 87, 93, 96, 102 and 120 which still haven't been upgraded yet, the rest were changed to FTTC.

If this is the case you "may" end up with FTTC, but don't quote me on that, and the "It's on hold awaiting further planning" could be correct.

So you still might be lucky.

Try and get your local MP involved.

Paul

Derby 105 was neither a commercial or a BDUK Cab

In reply to a post by Fastman2:

Derby 105 was neither a commercial or a BDUK Cab

I never meant to say it was, I was meaning that that cabinet has not long been upgraded, I know it was down as part of the commercial rollout back in 2011 and I cannot see any BDUK info for that exchange, so was it funded by their community?

I know it went live early this year or late last year so the info seems to say.

Paul

Hi Paul. Thanks very much for the info, it's much appreciated. Looking at the spreadsheet from 2011, it seems that the ones planned for FTTC are the ones that were previously upgraded. Those with FTTP plans seem to be the ones that were put on hold. With the odd exception of course. Seems a shame that those with plans for the better product on offer are the ones that are the ones that have to wait the longest.

Someone told me earlier that they heard that it's a lot more difficult to carry out work in Derby than most other locations as the current network is in a bit of a state due to poor design in the past. I'm not sure how accurate this is however.

In reply to a post by derby13:

Hi Paul. Thanks very much for the info, it's much appreciated. Looking at the spreadsheet from 2011, it seems that the ones planned for FTTC are the ones that were previously upgraded. Those with FTTP plans seem to be the ones that were put on hold. With the odd exception of course. Seems a shame that those with plans for the better product on offer are the ones that are the ones that have to wait the longest.

Well we have been waiting with all the FTTP hardware in their chamber and up the pole since end of 2011 where the install was put on delay in mid install leaving half our road and side roads with FTTP and the other half without.
BT Openreach have been down our road on and off most of the month doing more fibre work etc, I have been told by openreach first start of July, then end of July and now end of August, so I am hoping this is our date.

In reply to a post by derby13:

Someone told me earlier that they heard that it's a lot more difficult to carry out work in Derby than most other locations as the current network is in a bit of a state due to poor design in the past. I'm not sure how accurate this is however.

Not sure, possibly, for FTTP you would either need phone poles and or chambers/pits.
So in your case where I could only see a phone pole by the Ambulance Station, so BT Openreach would have to rely on having all the hardware in their chambers/pits and work from there, so if there are in a poor state or too small then this may become an issue.

I know FTTC is easer in most cases due to its placed right by the phone cabinet if not an EO Line and then bridged across and then uses the existing copper lines to the homes, however would require more planning permission for the cabinet placement etc, and this placement may have issues due to location etc, where as FTTP has no cabinet so one less planning required, but requires fibre being placed all the way to the home whether it be using chambers/pits linked up together up to either a pole with the fibre manifold (black bottle enclosure) or the fibre manifold would be in the chamber/pit and the fibre goes from there to the actual home.

All I am saying is you "might" get moved over to FTTC for ease and price due to all that were down for FTTP back in 2011 that actually got fibre was moved over to FTTC so this "may" be the case for you.

Which could be what they was referring to when they spoke about planning etc.
At least they didn't say sorry your not down for fibre, so this could still be a good thing.

Like I said try and get your local MP involved because they can help.

Paul