29 October 2014
10,000 premises milestone reached and forthcoming communites announced
More than 10,000 homes and businesses now have access to fibre broadband, thanks to the county council’s £18.8 million Superfast Leicestershire project and more areas to be connected have been announced
Leicestershire County Council and BT’s project has installed superfast broadband in parts of Syston, Barkby, East Goscote, Loughborough, Cossington, Foxton, Kibworth and Market Harborough, since work started in July. Areas which are live can be identified
Today, the next 38 towns and villages to benefit from high-speed fibre broadband are announced, once detailed planning and survey work is completed. A list of the communities is listed below. It is expected that areas will go live from winter 2014/15 and it is possible to search using the Interactive Map on the “When and Where” page – new areas are included in the brown shaded areas in the map.
Blaby District
Stoney Stanton
Additional parts of Blaby, Braunstone, Countesthorpe, Croft, Enderby, Narborough and Whetstone
Charnwood Borough
Barkby
Parts of Birstall
Additional parts of East Goscote and Syston
Harborough District
Ashby Parva, Bringhurst, Dunton Bassett, Frolesworth, Great Easton and Tur Langton
Most of Fleckney, Great Glen and Ullesthorpe
Additional parts of Scraptfoft
Hinckley and Bosworth Borough
Barlestone, Dadlington, Higham on the Hill and Stanton under Bardon,
Most of Markfield and Stoke Golding
Parts of Market Bosworth
Additional parts of Hinckley
Melton Borough
Most of Bottesford
North West Leicestershire District
Belton, Coleorton Thornton and Worthington
Parts of Thringstone
Additional parts of Castle Donington and Coalville
Pam Posnett, the county council’s cabinet member for broadband, said: “Reaching 10,000 homes and businesses is a major milestone. Superfast broadband makes a real difference to the strength of our communities and local economy and I look forward to hitting our eventual target of 62,000.”
Steve Henderson, BT’s regional director of next generation access, said: “Everyone involved with Superfast Leicestershire is delighted to have played a role in making fibre broadband available to more than 10,000 homes and businesses already. There’s more to come as well with the next phase of the project well underway and more communities being connected in the coming months.”
So far, BT has laid more than 120 kilometres of fibre cables and installed more than 50 new roadside fibre broadband cabinets. The first cabinet installed by the project was able to accept customer orders in July.