Residents of Alston Moor, a remote rural UK village in Cumbria, have begun using an up to 20Mbps fibre optic broadband cable link that they dug into the ground themselves. Locals who helped build the cable and microwave link to the Tees Valley now hope to push speeds even further, up to 100Mbps.

The Sunday Times story is in dramatic contrast to our article about Norfolk below, which despite its size will apparently still struggle to receive even 2Mbps by 2012 (here). The Alston scheme itself (Cybermoor) began after BT said (in 2002) that it would have been "unviable" to provide basic broadband to the area. BT did eventually deploy limited broadband in 2005, although some remote cottages were still out of range.


It's understood that house prices in the area have risen by 20-25% since the new service, which was partly funded by the government, was launched. This somewhat mirrors the survey we conducted last month (here), which revealed that over 50% of people would pay more for a house with a faster broadband connection.