Just been watching on the Parliament Channel those green leather bench arse-polishers in Westminster debating the the current aspirations and status of broadband provision to rural communities. Apparently, what's brought this current fascination on is that most of the fixed line broadband providers have written to the Minister in charge of telecomms complaining about BT's unwillingness to assist in further enabling them to extend their services to rural areas.

I think the phrase "Poverty of ambition" best decsribes this and the previous and current governments' response to this issue, in that the current and last government only aspire to providing a 2MB a second service (No good if you want to multitask over a line) to rural areas that haven't got Broadband already and the new Tory government have even put-back this program by three years in order to save money.

You'd have thought that with combined effects of recession and the moving of the economic focus to eastern europe, with the potential it has for leaving this country as an off-shore economic back water of Europe, they'd be pulling-out all and any of the stops to facilitate flexibity in the economy, even if that meant giving a temporary ignoring to some of the heartland Tory philosopy and indulging in a bit of Keynesian Government support on a one-of basis - if BT won't make the investment and are effectively holding back rural economic development perhaps now is the time to re-introduce a revised form of telecomm tax on telecomms company profits - which were recently reported as well up.

The technology to provide broadband through area wi-fi is all there, avoiding the need to incur large expense laying loads of fibre optic. That said, the Victorians must be spinning in their graves when they see the proportion of GDP which we are currently spending on infrastructure investment compared to themselves. I'm sure that with the provsion of some sort of electronic "Interruptor gear", dishes could even be mounted on the reverse side of wind turbines and their are plans for plenty of those in the West Country in particular - farmers would be unlikely to object -kerchnnng !

I was amused to see, true to form, that the boys in the Tattersall shirts on Tory backbenches were making the usual disingenuous noises of encouragement - of course most of them are in social grouping and income bands where the extension of broadband to rural areas is an irrelevance to their continued privileged lifestyles. I'm sure it ain't to a number of their constituents.

God this country is governed badly.

Nick

Edited 19 May, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

what demographic is super fast broadband in the rural area aimed at?

Answer: Those rich enough to be able to live in the country and commute.

So it begs the question why should the country invest?

what demographic is super fast broadband in the rural area aimed at?

Answer: Those rich enough to be able to live in the country and commute.

So it begs the question why should the country invest?

Sorry, that's a Tory cannon fodder argument. More poor people will benefit from upgraded broadband in rural areas than the rich.

And we're getting left behind while other countries, including some with wider wealth and income gaps than ourselves, are making the investment.

There are loads of impoverished areas in the rural community. And its usually the picture postcard places, especially the seaside resorts which only have summer trade, which are the poorest. Take for example, Barnstaple in North Devon. According to goverment statistics this has higher levels of poverty and deprivation than some inner cities.

If you take that position, the whole of the London Underground system wouldn't have been built - this essentially was a system for getting Victorian gentlemen to their jobs in the City of London - hardly mass transit. But it has evolved into a mass transit system - some say not a very good one because of this provenance, but better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick. Same goes for Cross Rail in London

IMHO, its better having the spin-off than cutting your nose-off to spite your face.

Nick

Edited 19 May, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

I wonder how something like WiMAX compares on cost and performance to what they have at the minute?

Would assume it's going to be cheaper than laying more cables down, and as long as the performance is up to it surely it's a better alternative? Not really looked into though, so not sure.

The problem is not straight forward. In all the old monopoly industries the incumbents have been deliberately disadvantaged against the competition, hence they see little incentive to invest.

The competition are only interested on investing in high profit areas and so not intrested in the countryside.

All that is needed is to allow bt a fair return on investment and some certainty in policy.

I live in a small village with 85 houses. My local exchange is about 5 miles away and I currently get 1.35mb broadband through BT. I pay them a stupid amount of money for an "up to 20mb" service and get a limit of 10gb of download a month. I cannot get great freeview coverage at present so use iplayer a lot which causes me to go over my 10gb usage every month.

The broadband suppliers are all the same, either they can't provide broadband to me because of my location or they charge an additional "fee" for providing me with a service. It's about time someone started supplying us little villages with proper broadband that we are paying for!!!

Another advantage of devolution, in that both the Scottish and Welsh Assembly's take a different attitude to Westminster, and are both pushing hard to get high speed broadband in rural areas, not because that's where the rich live (they don't!!) but because they realise that it is a way of encouraging business to open, improve, or grow. This keeps small communities active and hopefully prosperous.

Certainly my town noticed a small improvement when, following a factory closure, the WA forced BT to improve their telephone and broadband provision. We had several small businesses who were thinking of migrating towards Telford who decide to stay put, plus a couple of web designers opened.

The susprising improvement was the couple of people from the South East who had holiday homes here who now live here full time, doing most of their work over the 'net, and just make occasional visits to the office.

The cost of installing the optic fibre technology is bore by BT at their sole expense, then the parasites likes of Virgin,AOL and such, attach their gizmos to them once installed.

These non-BT companies have no financial outlay to help BT install this new optic fibre technology.

Speed depends on computer capability but also heavily how far/ close you live from the telephone exchange, using non-fibre optic technology.

The truth is no one in power gives a **** about anything outside of the M25.

Al the various companies charge the earth for services in the rest of the country to subsidise cutting edge services in London. C&W certainly told me that themselves.

It should be a requirement to lay fibre, even if it's dark, in every new development. every new house should have a fibre laid in with the standard copper line going back to the exchange. Cost would be minimal and at least there would be some provision for the future. Fibre runs should also be put in with every new road or train-line or major redevelopment of a road or train-line.

One local authority I know wanted to use the conduits that run alongside railways to run a fibre cable. The railway company did everything to obstruct this. They wouldn't pump the water out the pits, they wouldn't let people on side unless they had the right colour of florescent jackets (has to be orange not yellow), certain rail staff had to be present but were never available. The project went tits up after 2 years of this and they had to buy leased lines at great expense.

Good idea about the wind turbines but they produce a lot of interference from the coils in the generator.

Internet speed is a real issue for us with a rural business.

Speed test...

Download 344kbps

Upload 358kbps (Both approx 1/3 of 1MB)

I cant see how this can possibly be resolved. The line coming to us is over 1 mile long and serves only us. The cost for sorting us out would be enourmous, now roll that out to all the isolated homes/farms/hamlets over the UK...It aint going to happen.

The truth is no one in power gives a **** about anything outside of the M25.

Al the various companies charge the earth for services in the rest of the country to subsidise cutting edge services in London. C&W certainly told me that themselves.

It should be a requirement to lay fibre, even if it's dark, in every new development. every new house should have a fibre laid in with the standard copper line going back to the exchange. Cost would be minimal and at least there would be some provision for the future. Fibre runs should also be put in with every new road or train-line or major redevelopment of a road or train-line.

One local authority I know wanted to use the conduits that run alongside railways to run a fibre cable. The railway company did everything to obstruct this. They wouldn't pump the water out the pits, they wouldn't let people on side unless they had the right colour of florescent jackets (has to be orange not yellow), certain rail staff had to be present but were never available. The project went tits up after 2 years of this and they had to buy leased lines at great expense.

Good idea about the wind turbines but they produce a lot of interference from the coils in the generator.

Retards !

Network rail . . . another incarnation of the historic City of London principle, if there's any possibility that anything will be in short supply, we take onwership and stick a staple on it. Economic growth gets sacrificed and slowed down for short-term paroquial profit. Dark Ages Britain, they did the same under the guise of the livery companies of the middle ages, and they continue to do it today. And not a peep out of the competition commission.

The greedy,stupid and unimaginative run the country. Fullstop. As evidenced by what's dominating the media at the moment.

Nick

Edited 20 May, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

This is an issue close to my heart. I went from very stable full speed cable BB, to Sky's 20MB copper wire service which occasionally kicks out 2meg if I'm lucky.

There are plans to install a 20meg BB network across the whole of South Yorkshire. Digital Region is the idea, however, it has come to an abrupt halt due to the cuts and now will not come anywhere near my little hamlet. Booo!

Why can't we string optical cables up across the existing network of telephone poles? It would save the expense of digging up the roads.

Why can't we string optical cables up across the existing network of telephone poles? It would save the expense of digging up the roads.

They're working on it but BT is digging its heels in. No one will ever do these things unless there is a lot of money to be made and quickly.

they are not interested if the ROI is going to take 10 years. So we end up running on rotten copper from the 70s and not shifting to fibre until there is no option.

http://www.broadbandwatcher.co.uk/ofcom-to-resolve-telephone-pole-sharing-dispute-1613/

Rural? I live 2 miles from the centre of Luton and struggle to get 1.7 Mbps on ADSL, due to ancient infrastructure.

Lack of bandwidth is an issue, but government lacks an understanding of the technology, as always.

Phil

I can't see what the 'Problem' is for rural areas, assuming they too have got a budget to upgrade under Infinity. Microwave [Or satellite] link [Line of sight] from nearest Infinity enabled exchange to the town/village/hamlet and then WAN Wi-Fi it round the village to users. Can't be more expensive than laying fibre to hundreds of roadside boxes - that's what's happening here in North-West London-each fibre runs got to be at least a mile.

Nick

I can't see what the 'Problem' is for rural areas, assuming they too have got a budget to upgrade under Infinity. Microwave [Or satellite] link [Line of sight] from nearest Infinity enabled exchange to the town/village/hamlet and then WAN Wi-Fi it round the village to users. Can't be more expensive than laying fibre to hundreds of roadside boxes - that's what's happening here in North-West London-each fibre runs got to be at least a mile.

Nick

WiMax would be a much better option IMO. If you've got a few close villages then you can kill several birds with one stone. Yes, they'll need a reciver, but they'll need a modem and AP anyway. . .

WiMAX cannot deliver 70 Mbit/s over 50 kilometers (31 miles). Like all wireless technologies, WiMAX can operate at higher bitrates or over longer distances but not both. Operating at the maximum range of 50 km (31 miles) increases bit error rate and thus results in a much lower bitrate. Conversely, reducing the range (to under 1 km) allows a device to operate at higher bitrates. A city-wide deployment of WiMAX in Perth, Australia demonstrated that customers at the cell-edge with an indoor CPE typically obtain speeds of around 1–4 Mbit/s, with users closer to the cell tower obtaining speeds of up to 30 Mbit/s.

So up to 4Mbps 31 from the mast, not too bad really considering it needs no cabling (in the same way obtics etc do).

Presumably the extension of fibre based broadband technology, because of the high installation cost, is effectively economically restricted at first instance (Because of the shorter pay-back period) to certain population densities i.e. mainly towns.

Wimax could overcome that restriction.

As you say WiMax + say installation of transmitter in a wind turbine mast (Suitably shielded from other EMI) would give a good utilisation of the signal. Also wonder if there is a way of wireless connecting distributed transmitters to form one large virtual transmitter in the same way ground based radio telescopes are linked in order to boost sensitivity. Or perhaps using the a system similar to that used by local Ham radio operators a local signal repeater. Using the FON model, a limited range transmitter for ordinary wi-fi could be built-into anything, street lights, traffic signs and signals, freestanding solar-powered on stakes rather like garden lights, on a basket under a low-rise ballon -with a solar powered navigation light of course (Like the house developers use for advertising) People could buy them at BQ etc and plant them anywhere making there own creeping network.

Dare I say it, but wi-fi repeaters could be built into cars and lorries as an "Always-on" facility, there's your coverage immediately.

But, I suspect there is even a cheaper way of doing it than Wi-Max - Powerline data transmission. Most people in rural areas have electricity.

To use that much abused pharse, the possibilities are endless. Why isn't it being fixed ?

Trouble is you won't really know the full extent of rural broadband use until you provide the service, 'cause like all these things once its there people start finding loads of alternative uses they never even dreamt of before.

You wonder what farmers do for data comms these days. With all the farm related IT there is on pieces of equipment etc. Can't see the NFU missing a trick there.

Nick

Edited 24 May, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

Powerline broadband is probably a dead end. Some significant parts of the Gov are unhappy at EM emissions that come from them. them being the intelligence services and plod. It interferes with their listening gear.

Probably more significantly it interferes with digital TV and would further shove the DAB radio roll out into failville.

WiMax is viable for lots of rural communities. But people need to get over the NIMBYs who don't want to see transmitter masts anywhere. I think WiMAx needs line of sight too (I might be wrong on that) so communities in hilly areas might still have problems.

I know some Welsh communities have sorted things out themselves by setting up their own community satellite service.

http://www.broadband.coop/

http://www.community-broadband.co.uk/

nothing is centralised so it's doubtful much will be done.

It's a worry that our gov plans to give away 0.7% of our GDP to people who want to kill us or compete with our industries when the same amount of cash could go a long way to boosting our own population. The plan is for £11.5 billion to spent overseas in the next 4 years.

http://www.channel4.com/news/britains-foreign-aid-budget-money-well-spent

Spending on the UK for next gen broadband services? £830 million over 8-10 years (2 parliaments).

http://www.cwu.org/news/archive/broadband-investment-could-leave-uk-behind-in-europe.html

If you want fast broadband you'd be better off in Latvia or Romania

http://conversation.which.co.uk/technology/why-are-we-lagging-behind-worldwide-broadband-speeds/

I'm sure BT make enough via line rental costs/their ppm charge and "contract" charges to cover the costs of better broadband. They probably just don't want to.

I would love to get speeds of 1.5 and 1.7 Mbs, but no-one will sell me anything any faster than 512 Kbs.

All down to the builders of our estate using cheap aluminium wire for the phone lines and as such signal degradation is a huge issue as the alu breaks down!

I don't know if we will ever get anything quick due to the cost of replacing our whole infrastructure. Our nearest cable/fibre optic is miles away so I cannot see that happening either.

Tom

I'm sure BT make enough via line rental costs/their ppm charge and "contract" charges to cover the costs of better broadband. They probably just don't want to.

BT Openreach are not BT broadband.

Also everyone else wants BT to put down the huge up front cost, then to have the regulator force BT to rent them time on it for almost no profit.

To do that would be a brain dead model for any business.

While we're at it, I don't see Virgin forced to allow people to put cable equipment to utilisie their existing fibre network. Wonder why that is? Hmm

Extending the fibre network through the country could actually be a useful capital project, but should be government led.

Dare I say better than the 2012 Olympics, the Edinburgh Tram Project, ID cards, NHS NPfIT, and innumerable other stupid political vanity schemes.

Extending the fibre network through the country could actually be a useful capital project, but should be government led.

Dare I say better than the 2012 Olympics, the Edinburgh Tram Project, ID cards, NHS NPfIT, and innumerable other stupid political vanity schemes.

I was hoping that with the 2012 Olympics and specifically the sailing taking place between Weymouth and Portland that Weymouth might have seen fibre brought in for the long standing public (no cable service) and the council keep digging all our roads up all the time and install traffic lights (I think they have a traffic light fetish). Still at least I have Sky LLU to keep me going in the meantime