“When are we getting superfast broadband in Caldecote?” is a question I have been asked quite often lately. And with good reason.

After all, it was over a year ago now that Madingley Exchange became one of the six winners of the BT Race to Infinity, for the prize of an upgrade to the exchange to provide superfast fibre optic broadband.

There has been a lot of work going on in the background, and up till about September 2011, nothing seemed to be happening. However, in October, the rollout of superfast broadband for Madingley Exchange moved into the build stage, and you can read more about that in detail here.

In December 2011, a meeting with BT executives revealed that the superfast broadband would be coming to a PC near you sometime between February 2012 and Juy 2012, depending on location of your PC! Effectively, it is a staggered rollout, hence the spread of the rollout over time. The outcome of that meeting can be found here.

There will be three service types deployed, FTTC, which is Fibre-To-The-Cabinet, FTTP which is Fibre-To-The-Premises, and EO which is Exchange Only. As it turns out, there will be only two cabinets for FTTC deployment, one in Coton and the other in Hardwick, and everywhere else will be getting FTTP, with a few premises getting the EO service.

In the recent February update, the imminent arrival of superfast broadband to Madingley Exchange was confirmed and you can read more about it here. The first customers should be able to start placing orders as from April 2012, slightly later than initially hoped, but none-the-less, a welcome development. The first customers are expected to be those served by the Cabinet in Hardwick.

Over the past two to three weeks, there has been a lot of cable laying activity going on in Caldecote, and a lot of you would have seen white vans with large reels of cable beside or near the van, at various point in the village, and by the BP Garage and across the other side of the Childerley roundabout. Well, that’s all to do with the work to bring us superfast broadband using FTTP.

Caldecote will probably be looking to get service closer to June/July 2012. We just need to be patient a bit more.

There is the chance of having the BT Infinity bus visit us in the village, as part of an event or an award over the spring and summer time. So if you are planning a big-ish event do let us know, and we’ll see if it fits in with the BT plans.

I don’t know about you, but I am quite excited about the latest developments, and so looking forward to having superfast broadband at long last. Once again, thanks to everyone who worked so hard during the race itself to ensure our winning place – we will be celebrating properly come summer, so watch this space.