Broadway Partners Give Small Update on Pembrokeshire FTTP Build

Broadway Partners (ISP Broadway Broadband) has today issued a small update on the progress of their part publicly funded effort to deploy a new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network to cover several rural communities in Pembrokeshire (Wales), which states that they’ve just “connected” 88 premises in Ambleston.

At present, Broadway, which last year secured a massive investment boost of £145m from Downing LLP (here), is busy rolling out their full fibre network to various different rural communities in Wales and Scotland. The operator’s overall aim is to cover 250,000 UK premises by 2025.

As part of that they’ve also been working with the Government’s Gigabit Voucher scheme and the Pembrokeshire County Council’s Digital Connectivity Programme (DCP) to reach a number of rural communities (here, here, here and here), such as New Moat, Ambleston, Dale, Crymych, Herbrandston, Wiston, Slebech, Nevern, Angle, Tiers Cross and Lawrenny and Marletwy.

However, the work has not been without its challenges and delays (here), but they have today “celebrated” their progress in connecting 88 premises in Ambleston. But we’d much rather hear a progress update on all of their builds in the county, rather than that of one single small deployment.

Reece Simmons, Regional Manager for Broadway Partners, said:

“It’s great to be able to celebrate with the local community in Ambleston following our efforts to improve broadband in the area, alongside our various projects in wider regions. We’ve made great progress in the village already and more homes are being connected each day.

We’re extremely proud of this project in particular, and our hope is that it brings the community one step closer to bridging the digital divide, and reaping the benefits of superfast internet speeds. Our work in Ambleston is part of our larger investment and commitment to delivering reliable fibre networks in Wales, and we’re excited to see what the future holds in our mission to prevent digital exclusion.”

Despite this, when we ran the local SA62 5QY and SA62 5QZ postcodes for Ambleston through their checker, the result indicated that the service is still “coming” and offered a pre-registration form, which suggests to us that their network is not in fact fully live yet.

Meanwhile, residents in another Pembs community, Boncath, have complained to us about delays to the local delivery project and recently forwarded an update they had received from the provider.

Update on Broadway’s Fibre Build in Boncath

I would like to bring you up to date with progress on the rollout of full fibre across Pembrokeshire, and to Boncath in particular.

But first I would like to offer my and my team’s sincere apologies for the delay in delivering the long-promised fibre. You will have heard a succession of explanations for the delay from us – from Covid-induced shortages of telegraph poles and chips to Brexit-induced labour shortages.

While these have all been significant causes for delay, the real factor has been the sheer scale of the task. While individual community projects can be delivered in the 6-9 months that we originally indicated, the need to provide a contiguous solution across the greater part of Pembrokeshire has presented a quite different set of challenges – the need to raise significant funds (which we have done), to invest in design capabilities (done), and to cultivate and develop a reliable contractor base (which we are in the process of doing, in conjunction with Pembrokeshire Council, including the establishment of a training facility to develop local skills).

I readily admit that we should have foreseen the consequence of this larger challenge much sooner, and modified our timescale estimates accordingly. We didn’t, and I am sorry for the frustration this has caused.

The good news is, first, that all this investment in systems, processes and resources will result in a stronger, more resilient network; a deeper, more resilient supply chain; more efficient build and operations; and ultimately, a higher quality, lower cost service to the customer. The service, when it arrives, I can confidently say will have been worth the wait. Our customers in Ambleston and Dale will attest to that.

The second piece of good news is that we have a plan for Boncath – and fibre really is coming! Current indications are for detailed survey work to begin in December, leading to the finalisation of detailed designs in February and for the build to start in earnest in March. Our marketing team will keep you closely informed of any changes to the schedule.

The third piece of news is that we fully accept the frustration and inconvenience caused by the delay in rollout and, as previously indicated, will happily compensate householders where they have been out of pocket as a result of moving to a ‘pay monthly’ tariff.

Once again, I apologise most sincerely for the delays in bringing fibre to Boncath. Rest assured that we will not be resting until the work is done!

Enjoy the rest of the summer,

Kind regards,

Michael Armitage

Director

At present it remains unclear when that work will finally be done.