Cheshire East UK Claims 95% Superfast Broadband Coverage

The state aid fuelled Connecting Cheshire project, which is working with Openreach (BT) to extend the local reach of “fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) ISP networks to an additional 100,000 premises by the end of 2018 (98% coverage), has announced that 95% of Cheshire East can now access “superfast” speeds of 24Mbps+.

The fact that only the east side of Cheshire has announced meeting the UK government’s Broadband Delivery UK coverage target is perhaps a hint that the overall project still has some work left to do. We should also point out that B4RN’s community driven 1Gbps FTTH rollout recently entered the county and is busy making progress (here).

Councillor Paul Bates, Cheshire East Council, said:

“Fibre broadband is having a huge impact, with so many more online services reliant on a fast internet connection, whether at work or at home.

I would urge everyone to check their availability and where possible, make a switch – as we have a ‘gainshare’ arrangement with Openreach, which means we can reinvest a share of their revenue into more coverage to reach areas not yet able to benefit.”

Matthew Hemmings, Openreach Infrastructure Director for the North, said:

“This is without doubt an extraordinary achievement and I’d like to thank the hundreds of Openreach engineers across Cheshire and our suppliers, who have worked so tirelessly to make this happen. High-speed fibre broadband helps to ensure that businesses thrive and don’t just survive and it helps to keep communities connected. Whatever you do online, you can do it better with fibre broadband.”

We should point out that Cheshire has already set aside an additional public investment worth £7.25 million for a future coverage expansion contract (here).