UK Fibrestream (NextGenUs), a community network specialist in Next Generation [Internet] Access (NGA) services, has secretly started to develop a 100Mbps (Megabits per second) speed Fibre-to-the-Home ( FTTH ) fibre optic broadband internet service for the isolated rural villages of Ashby de la Launde and possibly Bloxholm in the North Kesteven district of Lincolnshire (England).

Until today the project had been a closely guarded secret and further details were apparently not due to be released for another 6-8 weeks. However a recent blog post on the Fibrestream site promptly challenged readers to "work out which local community in the Final Third is getting FTTH this summer", which was accompanied by a cryptic aerial picture of the village in question.

One of our readers (Phil) was soon able to spot that the aerial picture looked virtually indistinguishable from Ashby de la Launde (see below for a Google Maps satellite overview). According to the 2001 census Ashby de la Launde and Bloxholm, which are both part of the same civil parish and likely to be equally included with Fibrestreams project, had a population of 796.


Last week a BBC Radio interview with Fibrestream's Director (Listen to the MP3 Podcast Here), Guy Jarvis, revealed that the project was close to achieving its minimum subscriber target for the development to be considered economically viable. They hope to hit their target within the next couple of weeks and allow the real work to begin.

Fibrestream typically seeks to foster an active and practical engagement with local communities. This means that the group encourages local residents to help with both planning where their fibre optic cable might go and even to assist in digging the trenches for it. This improves the economic viability of deploying superfast broadband to remote locations.

Last year saw Fibrestream working with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) in Humber, a large tidal estuary situated on the east coast of Northern England, to do something similar (here). Amazingly the groundwork's were ultimately completed by the lifeboat crew literally digging their own fibre.

Further details have yet to be revealed and the BBC Radio interview is unspecific about the precise method being adopted for Ashby de la Launde. Fibrestream are also known to be working with other communities in the area too. We expect that this will not be the only rural Lincolnshire village to get a superfast broadband link.