Its that time of year when we give and receive gifts as we celebrate Christmas. If there’s one gift that a lot of Caldecote residents that I’ve spoken to would like, it is superfast broadband. Whilst I cannot promise that BT Santa would deliver, I can give you some update on the progress of rollout of BT Infinity in our area.
Following on from the September update, a summary of progress across the exchange area as at end of November 2012 is that all of the FTTC (Fibre To The Cabinet) is complete, EO (Exchange Only) is complete, 4 PON (Passive Optical Network) areas have been released, 1 PON area was in commissioning and one failed commissioning.
It had been hoped that all but a couple of hundred premises within the exchange area would be enabled by Christmas, but as it is all of Hardwick and Coton are now enabled, as well as Dry Drayton Estates area. A small section of Caldecote is enabled – namely Grafton Drive, the top of West Drive and St Neots Road.
The PON area that was referred to as being in commissioning covers the centre of Madingley itself.
Unfortunately the PON area that failed commissioning, is the biggest PON area and covers most of Highfields Caldecote.
The commissioning tests in November showed there were broken fibres, and it seems the fibres tended to get broken during termination at the PON unit. BT Openreach have been working very hard since then to fix the problems as quickly as they can.
As soon as these 2 final PON areas are released, with the exception of the couple of hundred premises that will need the aerial cable solution, the Madingley exchange area will be complete. More importantly, the rest of Caldecote will be enabled for the superfast information highway.
We are getting there, albeit at a slower pace than had initially been anticipated.
I am chasing BT for updates and BT is chasing Openreach for an update on the release of the 2 final PON areas.
Watch this space ………