An additional 1,000 rural homes and businesses in South Gloucestershire are to benefit from the rollout of high-speed fibre broadband thanks to the £35.6 million Great Western Broadband (GWB) partnership between South Gloucestershire Council (SGC), Wiltshire Council and BT.
Work has progressed well with the current rollout and the project has been extended to include the following rural communities within the existing funding: Aust, Hawkesbury Upton, Horton, Marshfield, Winterbourne and additional parts of Pucklechurch and Downend.
SGC has also announced the inclusion of a number of industrial parks and trading estates across South Gloucestershire including Emerald Park Industrial Estate in Emersons Green, additional parts of North Road Industrial Estate in Yate and Westerleigh Business Park, also in Yate.
The first homes and businesses in these locations will be able to order fibre broadband services from early spring next year.
Extending the rollout will increase the total number of premises served by the project to 16,000 on completion in spring 2015.
Cllr John Goddard, Chair of Resources Sub Committee, said:
“I am delighted to be able to announce that communities in Aust, Hawkesbury Upton, Horton village, Marshfield, Winterbourne and additional parts of Pucklechurch and Downend will benefit from the current rollout. We are pushing the fibre broadband coverage as far as we can within the available funding to include as many communities in the rollout as possible.”
“We recognise that not all areas in South Gloucestershire will benefit from the current rollout of superfast broadband. Due to ‘state aid’ rules the council is not currently able to invest in areas where there is already a commercial provider. However, we are working hard to try and find a solution and source further funding so that the project can be rolled out to even more premises.”
Matt Lloyd, Programme Director for BT, said:
“From the outset the project has been designed to extend the availability of high-speed fibre broadband to the vast majority of homes and businesses in South Gloucestershire. Today’s excellent news is that we’re now planning to reach an additional 1,000 premises in rural locations across the area.”
“We believe fibre broadband is essential to the communities we serve and are working with our partners to roll it out as far as we can with the money available to deliver excellent value for money. This is one of the most important infrastructure projects of our age and I’m proud of the role BT’s playing.”
Visit www.southglos.gov.uk/broadband to find out more about the broadband project and check to see when you will get access to fibre broadband (if you are within in the intervention area).
Great News
Could someone in authority please say when Arden Close Bradley Stoke be connected to high speed broadband.
I am not optimistic that I will receive an answer!