Bournemouth gets broadband…
Promising super-fast broadband for everyone, Bournemouth has been chosen as the home for the UK’s first “Fibrecity,” because of its superb, err… sewer system!
Yes, Bournemouth will soon be the first city in England to boast the Fibrecity status, and not because of it’s notoriety as a colourful seaside city that comes complete with tacky tourist attractions and over-priced souvenirs.
Oh no, the reason that H2O Networks has chosen Bournemouth over 49 other English cities goes a lot deeper underground than that…
Because of their waste water system, the people of Bournemouth will soon be the privileged residents of a Fibrecity. And all this week, as a welcoming present, every home and business in the Bournemouth Borough Boundary will be invited to connect to the network for free.
The British seaside city, renowned for its seven miles of “golden” sand, will have fibre-optic cables installed into its pipelines, meaning its residents will all soon be able to take advantage of services such as IPTV and home medical monitoring, and businesses will have 22nd Century connectivity at their fingertips.
A typical house in revolutionary Bournemouth will not look misplaced in an episode of The Jetsons.
Work to install the fibre-optic cables, which will cost about £30million and will be entirely funded by H2O Networks, will begin as soon as September, but there will be little, if any disruption to the city, as laying the cables in the sewer system will happen completely underground.
As a cost effective alternative to installing cables aboveground, the project will deliver ultra high bandwidth to all Bournemouth’s businesses and more than 88,000 homes at speeds far exceeding current DSL or cable modem speeds, typically by tens or even hundreds of Mbps. And users will have unlimited access to FTTH (fibre-to-the-home), meaning faster downloads and more communication opportunities.
Brilliant news for the people of Bournemouth, as the normally very expensive installation costs will be reduced because the sewer system is already in place. So providers will be able to reflect these savings in competitively priced service packages.
The estimated completion date for all the cables to be installed is September 2010, buying everyone else enough time to pack up their belongings and relocate to the special city.
Or alternatively, you could wait for the next Fibrecity to be built. But who’s next for the underground treatment? Well, Dundee will be the first Scottish Fibrecity, and after that, the world is H20 Network’s oyster. I’m placing my bet’s that it’ll be a little while before London gets fibre-ised…
Oh, and here’s a little bit of bonus trivia for all of you who were wondering, there are 50 cities in England, and 66 in the whole of the UK. I counted them all myself.
