Good Progress as Greater Manchester UK Extends Fibre Broadband

The Get Digital Faster scheme has effectively completed its original £15 million contract, which means that BT’s “fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) network has now been expanded to an additional 46,000 homes and businesses in the Greater Manchester (England) area.

The on-going roll-out, which started in July 2014 and was funded by investment from BT, the Broadband Delivery UK programme and the EU (ERDF), focused on delivering upgrades to eight of the main local authorities: Stockport, Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Tameside, Trafford and Wigan.

Sadly Manchester itself and Salford were not included because they’d already received investment from elsewhere and BDUK funding is not intended to be used in dense urban areas. Overall 500 new street cabinets have so far been installed, with the most recent one going live in the rural village of Mellor, near Marple (Stockport).

Alex Ganotis, Leader of Stockport Council, said:

“I’m delighted that we have reached this milestone on the Get Digital Faster programme. As the way we all communicate and do business evolves, access to a reliable, high speed internet connection is an essential part of unlocking the potential of Stockport.”

Interestingly the original contract actually aimed to reach 39,000 extra premises by the end of March 2016, although this was later revised upwards to 45,000 (here) and today’s news states that the contract will now finish by delivering to “more than” 47,000 premises by Spring 2017 (this should bring the street cabinet count to 590).

The programme is also hoping to further extend the availability of Superfast Broadband across the eight Metropolitan Borough Council areas of Greater Manchester via an extension contract, although precise details of this have yet to be announced and the project’s website is woefully devoid of any useful information, not even a basic map or progress updates.