Responding to Protests – Grain Pledges to Never Use Telecoms Poles UPDATE
The recent increase in protests against the use of telecoms poles, which are often used to deploy new full fibre broadband ISP infrastructure across the UK, has prompted one network operator, Grain (Grain Connect), to reinforce its pledge to “never use poles as part of network deployment“.
Grain has so far unveiled full fibre builds for over 50 locations across the country (plus 150 new build housing developments), which includes patches of various urban areas like Leicester, Liverpool, Accrington, Grimsby, Cleethorpes, Scarborough, Carlisle, Barrow-in-Furness, Hartlepool, Newport, Sunderland, Blackburn and so forth. But they’ve revealed no information on their premises passed and take-up progress.
The operator is also deploying in a number of locations that have recently been impacted by protests against the use of poles to deploy new fibre. Poles are fairly cost-effective and have long since become a common sight across much of the UK, but they tend to cause irritation when they pop up in areas that haven’t previously had them.
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Suffice to say, we’ve definitely observed a rise in complaints as more operators make use of them (examples here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here). But not all operators are using poles and, in light of the recent concerns, Grain has moved to “reinforce” their pledge “never” to use them.
Grain’s Statement
We are closely following recently launched resident-led campaigns in parts of Lancashire, Yorkshire and Hull, protesting against the use of unsightly poles in any Full Fibre broadband rollout.
Residents in some areas have started campaigns to boycott networks that are installing telegraph poles onto their streets, in protest at the use of unsightly poles being erected and their dismay at a lack of consultation about this.
We wanted to make it clear that Grain does not use poles as part of their network and has pledged never to do so and will always bury our cables underground.
The catch is that this will make some parts of Grain’s network (i.e. areas where they can’t run new fibre via Openreach’s existing ducts and poles) slower, louder and more costly to build, which can result in a higher cost per premises and – in a market that is already under strain from rising costs and competition – that won’t necessarily make the job of reaching maximum coverage and a viable payback any easier.
Nevertheless, many of those protesting against poles will welcome a stance like this, which could generate some positive feedback for Grain and potentially aid their expansion; it will be interesting to see if any other network operators see viability in making a similar pledge.
UPDATE:
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Thinkbroadband has informed us that they currently estimate Grain’s full fibre network to cover around 60,000 premises (RFS).
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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What that said to me is “we’ll bypass your property if we can’t build underground”
I’m sorry but this has to be the dumbest way to expand PR for them imo, putting aside this only works for urban areas or areas with openreach (which some would say needs to be avoided.) it also feeds the trolls in the sense that it gives the impression that any of these blanket no pole protests make sense, which they do not in most cases. The is no rights for which they seen to claim. (Also offtopic it seems most objections on related infrastructure such as 5G towers are based on misinformation, which is good to note.)
Not to mention higher investment costs (which I’m sure all investors love) and higher maintenance and other things that are obvious. We’ll have to see how this plays out.
wouldn’t maintenance be lower as protected from the elements?
Not aware of Grain using PIA at all, Mark. Their patches of coverage, in the case of the ones near me a few densely populated streets of terraced houses, seem to be all their own dig.
Believe they use PtP fibre and their own duct and tobies for every premises passed. May not be every one, may be exceptions but PIA if it is there is the exception.
Grain are currently building in my street and they are great seeing all the underground connection points at each house. However they just ignore vast swathes of houses. The entire odd side of my street was going to be ignored until I and my next door neighbour both agreed to sign up on the same day with them. Which they said unless we did, our side of the street will be ignored.
So those pole complainers will be happy to have their local roads, footways and their driveways dug up instead and disruption that lasts for weeks or months?
Harv as I understand it having cables underground costs more. Yes it protects cables from winter weather, but not from contractors cutting cables by mistake
“never use poles” or “never install their own poles”?
Many properties are already served from Openreach poles. I don’t think anyone would object to their re-use by altnets, although the number they can carry is limited.
I guess in an increasingly crowded market, altnets are looking for *something* to distinguish themselves, especially when most of them do nothing except install cables along existing ducts and poles.
It’s got a bit ridiculous, with the number of poles being installed in certain areas and what they’re being used for. As an example take a look at the A676 in Bolton; 6G Broadband have installed additional new poles along the road, using the route for backhauling connectivity to Bradshaw and Harwood. The cables appear to be touching lamp post’s in between spans, with some anchored and some loose; Various spans criss cross the road along the route and it doesn’t look good.
I believe the legislation states that Communication Providers should look at ducts as a first choice where available, only using poles as a last resort, but the Government have allowed a lot of leeway by allowing commercial viability as a get out of jail free card; The CP’s will probably argue it’s too expensive to use PIA, so we have to use poles instead.
6G Broadband (IX Wireless) appear to be upsetting people all over the place, I’m guessing many will shun the company’s services.
https://www.ixwireless.co.uk/cities
https://www.ixwireless.co.uk/cities/bolton
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/massive-poles-popping-up-across-26530099
https://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/9544-we-visited-one-of-the-6g-internet-streets-or-should-it-be-wifi-6-internet
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11290685/Residents-fury-6G-broadband-40ft-high-telegraph-poles-appear-street-without-warning.html
Most Alt nets are expanding or claim to be but the market is increasingly very crowded
UK coverage with FTTP seems to be increasing quite fast., It looks to be at present increasing by about 1% in just over 3 weeks
There must be an ever increasing amount of overbuild now. At a guess an Alt net needs take up o at least 20% just to breakeven and that’s going to be increasingly hard to obtain
If residents boycott your service because of poor build, three poles where there used to be one or none at all, any cost savings are illusionary. Smart move by Grain especially if they engage with the resident protest areas.
It’s a nice, if superficial, PR move for sure. Liaising with communities isn’t going to move the dial though.
Altnets need scale. ASAP. Investors aren’t going to be especially interested in the moral high ground if the build and operational costs are too high.
Grain are building like a cable company, and that went well last time. With the added bonus that they tend to be overbuilding Openreach, VMO2 and often CityFibre plus at least another altnet.
They are also building pockets of dense terraces for the most part. These are unlikely to be DiG and far more likely to have existing poles or ducts and, in urban areas, to have seen at least cable build if not CityFibre too.
I’ve no idea what the longer term plan is with these guys. Short of their build in Hull, if they finish it, I can’t see what else they have that someone else will pay the kind of prices they’d demand for.
Given their suicidal attitude towards overbuild they’ve no chance of getting the take up they need, and with this construction method no chance of getting the scale they need in time.
If they are doing way better than imagined they’ll have no problem publishing some numbers. If, as suggested by their Leeds build, the plan is to build a patch of terraced streets so that they can claim a presence in the city built for £x, not including the costs of getting those properties connected to the Internet or doing it insanely on the cheap with no scalability it makes more sense.
Massively cherry-pick areas within cherry-picked areas to produce a build cost superficially attractive to an investor and hope the ‘FibreBubble’ gets it sold.
Hull and that area aside of course, because KCom. That has some potential. The rest, superficially, seems insane.
It’s got a bit ridiculous, with the number of poles being installed in certain areas and what they’re being used for. As an example take a look at the A676 in Bolton; 6G Broadband have installed additional new poles along the road, using the route for backhauling connectivity to Bradshaw and Harwood. The cables appear to be touching lamp post’s in between spans, with some anchored and some loose; Various spans criss cross the road along the route and it doesn’t look good.
I believe the legislation states that Communication Providers should look at ducts as a first choice where available, only using poles as a last resort, but the Government have allowed a lot of leeway by allowing commercial viability as a get out of jail free card; The CP’s will probably argue it’s too expensive to use PIA, so we have to use poles instead.
6G Broadband (IX Wireless) appear to be upsetting people all over the place, I’m guessing many will shun the company’s services.
I originally posted my opinion, as Bolton Resident, with links to various articles highlighting the frustration with IX Wireless, but it showed as being moderated and hasn’t appeared so re-posting without links.
IXWireless are, thankfully, an edge case.
No-one else has taken the liberties they have.
It’s well known on here they’re awful, and it’s known they’re awful precisely because they aren’t the norm.
In most cases when residents get upset over poles altnets try and change minds and if that fails uproot them and move on.
Looking at the state Swish have left the paths in Banbury I would be wary of what you wish for.
BRSK installing poles on Withymoor Village, Brierley Hill. We already have fibre broadband in underground ducts, as the Village was constructed to have no unsightly poles. BRSK are not advising residents where poles are being placed. Residents are up in arms. We are raising petitions for each road to have them stopped and removed. They are ignoring residents concerns, we have our local councillors and MP involved.
You don’t have full fibre, Raymond, you have fibre to the cabinet. I can’t see the exact boundaries but at best very little and at worst none of the estate has full fibre.
Given the time it was built and that you’re surrounded by Openreach full fibre and don’t have any I’d suggest you have no ducts in the ground that Brsk or anyone else can use as your copper cables are direct in ground.
Please see https://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/index.php?tab=2&election=1#15/52.4653/-2.1247/geafttp/ – you do not have the full fibre Brsk want to build, and if that’s what your campaign is based around, that you already have fibre, it’s worth reconsidering that part.
Anyone that deploys full fibre into your estate will either use poles or dig it all up, and digging it all up would be super expensive due to the housing being detached and semis with a fair bit of distance between them. Many budget about £300 per home passed, you folks would come in very approximately around a grand. Similar spacing to an estate I lived on, that came in at over £1,200 a premises due to some block paving on top.
If you reject poles and win your campaign that’s fine but be aware there’s a decent chance you will be in the 15% of the UK that do NOT have full fibre in 2025-6: you’re at the mercy of Virgin Media as you aren’t in Openreach’s plans at all. Not even the ones for up to 2026. Just down the road in Kenyon Close, Amblecote they’re good to go.
I have spoken to a local councillor at Dudley MBC, on this topic, they are aware of the concerns raised by residents in relation to brsk plans. I am informed the council are unable to do much as poles are a permitted development. If there any objections, please email wmpole@brsk.co.uk
Just be mindful here, Openreach don’t have any plans to upgrade parts of the Southern Black Country to FTTP in the near future, and currently the only provider who can supply ultra fast internet is a Virgin Media in parts of the area, but their pricing and service isnt that great.
That being said, Its quite ironic, that there are complaints about an alt net putting up poles to provide ultra fast broadband, especially when there is a large TV, radio transmitter tower sat on the leading edge and overshadows the village.
Sorry had to have a giggle at that one.
Question: For this issue with poles being erected. Would this be solved if they forced everyone to ditch the copper in unison and all go FTTP. This would free up space in current ducting or overhead poles? Does this not seem a logical solution to all these battles?
Sadly not. For one what do people use in between losing the copper and the fibre installs? Copper cable will have to be removed, fibre network built and all the installs done.
Removing the copper may cause damage to ducts or ducts may be damaged already, requiring repair before copper removal which will only be found after starting the cable removal.
This ignoring the commercial issues of at best ensuring Openreach get first dibs everywhere, forcing them to replace copper on a timescale that isn’t theirs, etc.
This also assumes there are ducts in the first place. The road my parents live on has the telephone lines buried directly in the ground.
Personally if I’m getting FTTP I don’t care if it’s via poles or ducts. I’ve lived in both poled and poleless areas and hardly notice the difference.
I’m pretty non-NIMBY, and poles in principle don’t bother me (I grew up in an area where electricity/phone is overhead) but I can kind of get the criticism if some altnet rocks up and decides to use poles where no one else has, and solely to save investors’ money.
To me the silly complaints are where Openreach has to add, change or move a pole in an existing overhead area to accommodate FTTP.
Wonder if those same people are complaining about the state of their broadband and wondering why they aren’t getting anything else?
I have a pole in front of my window here, could not care less. Don’t really think about it, just need to ask openreach to put one in front of my other window as well
Grain is currently being installed on my street in Grimsby. It has been a nightmare they are so slow, have broken all the paving and laid it back down uneven, the installed street boxes next to the houses some are cemented nearly an inch above the ground. Grain is going to go under, its literally trying this out took the grants and isn’t bothered about completing it will just get swallowed up by bt as they need fibre virgin already have it. No way i would pay these guys over £1200 per property its q complete mess, scratched cars, uncovered holes. And the mess and dust was awful covered all the households and right in the peak of summer. The noise of all the cutters and the cheap workforce swearing and talking cheap when kids are around and leaving for school, i got looked up and down when i couldnt leave my house as it was all blocked off, i asked the guys to move it and they didnt even bother i had to walk over a broken sink where the fencing ended and couldnt access my car. They offered me it for £1 for 6 months.. No way would i ever.
To offer balance. The guys in Newcastle installing to my estate have been fantastic. Also if the paving is uneven or cracked. It doesn’t pass inspection and get signed off. They get forced to put it right. 100% guaranteed. so don’t worry about how it looks now. They will fix it.
What am I missing, doesn’t it make sense to use poles in areas that already have it? its less environmental impact?
When it was only BT it was not a problem. With the free for all we have now it is. They need to come under planning. Poles should be a last resort. If there i already duct capacity or existing pole capacity that should be used
As someone in a underground only estate I’d happily take a pole if it meant I got FTTP – I live in a 70s estate and no one wants to do PIA as the ducts are 50 years old and unusable. Trooli just skipped the majority of the estate and Giganet are managing a road every couple of weeks via mole (currently a year behind original estimates).
Ah grain, who skipped our and the neighbours house, but put in boxes for every other house in the road, but still leafleted us apologising for the disruption during their build but pointing out that we’ll soon have access to their faster internet services, or not.
Quite happy that Brsk have come in with new telegraph poles!