UPDATE2 Aylesbury Vale Broadband Project Lifts Target Speed to 1000Mbps

The £1.5m Aylesbury Vale Broadband project, which is supported by the district council in Buckinghamshire (England) and aims to improve connectivity for residents of several rural villages (North Marston and Granborough with more to follow), has lifted its future service speed target from 30Mbps to 1000Mbps.

The pilot scheme was first covered in our news during March 2015 (here), at which point there wasn’t a lot of information available about the plan. But we now know that it will involve the deployment of a new fibre optic (FTTP/H) network and this will initially deliver speeds of at least 100Mbps (Megabits per second), rising to 1000Mbps within the first 12 months.

Apparently AVB has also received 200 registrations of interest in the service, which is well above the projects initial goal of 70, and a similar quantity of registrations have also arrived from 25 other villages within the vale area.

AVB Project Update

“We are still working to have customers going live on our network in June (unfortunately due to unforeseen issues with 3rd parties our timeline has slipped a week or two) and this date is dependant on crossing a few more obstacles. I will keep you posted.

Soon I will be asking for registrations from people (within North Marston and Granborough) who want to be the first to receive ultra-fast broadband. Based on this information we will plot where we will start laying our network. So if you want ultra-fast broadband then start speaking with your neighbours, because the more people in an area that want to be amongst the first receiving it then the greater the chance is we will go there first.

And one more announcement. One of our key objectives is to support our local communities wherever possible and that means spending as much of our budget as we can locally. To that end, over the past couple of months, I have been forging partnerships with local companies to deliver part of our infrastructure. At this stage approximately 50% of our total budget will be spent with local companies and individuals – and that figure will increase as we award more contracts.

And it is important to know that our partners are providing their services at cost or below – they want our communities to succeed and they know how important ultra-fast broadband is. AVB is a community driven initiative.”

The areas identified by AVB as in need of help are those locations that appear set to miss out on coverage through the local Connected Counties project. As for the pilot locations, North Marston is home to around 800 people, while Granborough’s population sits at about 600 and Hogshaw is tiny with around 80 locals to its name

Mind you it hasn’t all been plain sailing, not least with local wireless ISP Village Networks complaining that they already serve the area with broadband speeds of ‘up to’ 24Mbps (1Mbps upload); although it needs to be “greater than” 24Mbps in order to officially be considered “superfast” and VN’s service would set you back a steep £50 per month.

UPDATE 30th May 2015

Apparently the primary package from Village Networks is being tweaked to offer 24Mbps+ of unlimited usage for £30 inc. VAT a month and some parts of their network will also be able to deliver up to 40Mbps.

UPDATE 23rd June 2015

Local ISP Rapid Rural confirms that they are also offering a fixed wireless 100Mbps+ broadband solution to North Marston from £35 per month.