UPD Otley Homes Suffer Broadband Woes After Lorry Destroys BT Cabinet

Homes and businesses near Waitrose in the market town of Otley (Leeds) could suffer over a month of unstable broadband connectivity after a lorry crashed into one of Openreach’s (BT) street cabinets. The cabinet was promptly replaced but problems with the power supply remain.

Judging by YEP’s description, we think it’s the cabinet on the corner of Westgate (pictured above in better times). A closer inspection reveals that Openreach have today been conducting roadworks in the same location to excavate and expose an “existing power cable in Footway,” which seems to line up with what we know.

The crash itself happened approximately two weeks ago and Openreach were able to replace the cabinet, although unfortunately Northern PowerGrid say they are unable to reconnect the mains electricity supply until 15th August 2017. As a temporary solution Openreach’s engineers have been arduously swapping out the cabinet’s backup battery twice a day (6am and 6pm) but this obviously impacts reliability.

Sandy Lay, Local LibDem Councillor, said:

“Affected customers are really suffering due to a failure of Openreach and Northern Power Grid to work together. It’s been two weeks already with a delay of another seven weeks before the main supply is proposed to get back to normal.

Clearly this is unacceptable and just not good enough. Affected customers want stable, reliable internet and not the disruption and chaos they’ve been getting for the last fortnight whilst these huge companies have failed to work together for the benefit of their customers.”

The cabinet itself looks to be one of Openreach’s smaller ECI boxes, which will be delivering Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) services to local premises and can handle up to 128-256 lines (assuming we’re looking at the right one, there are three in the same area – P3, P15 and P16). We’ve queried the situation and are awaiting a reply.

UPDATE 29th June 2017

Good news, it appears as if the power company may have finally bowed to some local pressure and resolved the problem.

A Spokesperson for Openreach told ISPreview.co.uk:

“We’re equally frustrated about the wait for power to connect our fibre broadband cabinet in Otley. The cabinet was finally connected by the power company yesterday and our broadband services should be back up and running for all those affected. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this caused.”