Worcestershire UK Confirms the Phase 2 Fibre Broadband Rollout Areas

The £20.75 million Superfast Worcestershire project in England has today revealed the next batch (phase two) of local communities that will benefit from a state aid supported upgrade to BT’s “high-speed fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) network (aims to pass 90% of local premises by mid-2016).

The scheme currently seeks to help connect nearly 55,000 extra homes and businesses to the service, which is on top of the 176,000 premises that BT’s separate commercial deployment aims to have achieved by the end of Spring 2014.

The first areas to benefit from the new scheme were announced at the start of this year and covered upgrades that would run from April to the end of September 2014 (here), thus today’s announcement naturally focuses on the October – December 2014 period.

Phase 2 Superfast Worcestershire Upgrades

Belbroughton
Blakedown
Chaddesley Corbett
Clows Top
Cutnall Green
Eckington
Elmley Castle
Great Witley
Hanley Swan
Hartlebury
Kempsey
Knightwick
Leigh Sinton
Ombersley
Peopleton
Powick
Rock
Upton Snodsbury
Wichenford
Wolverley

Infill Areas (Extending Existing FTTC Coverage)
Bewdley
Kidderminster
Pershore
Stourport

To coincide with this latest development, over the next week or so, businesses in several areas of Worcestershire will be able to meet face-to-face with a member of the Superfast Worcestershire team at a series of free roadshows organised by Worcestershire Business Central (more details here – www.business-central.co.uk).

It’s worth pointing out that the project in Worcestershire has yet to announce how it will make use of the additional Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) funding (here), which is designed to push the national UK coverage target up from 90% in 2015/16 to 95% by 2017. Meanwhile it should similarly be noted that Worcestershire’s project is another one that fails to say precisely what portion of their current 90% target will receive “superfast” (25Mbps+) speeds.