Ten thousand more Cumbria homes and businesses get faster broadband

Three more communities now benefiting from roll-out programme; 

Invest in Cumbria welcomes new development

BT announced today that faster broadband is now available to more than 10,000 more homes and businesses in Cumbria.

Brampton, Walney Island and Wetheral are among the latest communities in the county to benefit from upgrades as part of the roll-out of BT’s next generation broadband service delivered over copper lines.

The BT investment will make available download speeds of up to 20 megabits per second (Mbps) – more than double the fastest speed previously available from BT.

The new service is now accessible to nearly 120,000 county premises and is available on an open, wholesale basis to all companies providing broadband*.

John Grainger, managing director of Invest in Cumbria, said: “The announcement from BT confirms their commitment to the development of faster broadband in Cumbria.

“The latest areas to benefit demonstrate that it is not just the larger towns that are feeling the benefit and also that there is a geographical spread across the county.

“Cumbria is striving to be competitive in terms of its business offering and the enabling of these locations to access faster broadband is greatly welcomed. The enhanced well-being to our communities will also be derived through the ability of telecoms providers to link customers to these ever improving broadband services.”
Mike Blackburn, BT’s regional director for the North West, said: “Faster broadband will deliver important benefits for people across the region, whether they are running a business, working or studying from home, doing the weekly shop online, downloading films and TV programmes or keeping in touch with friends and family around the world. It can all be done better using faster broadband.

“That’s why BT is determined to bring faster speeds to as many homes and businesses as possible.”
This investment in the copper network is in addition to BT’s £2.5 billion roll-out of fibre-based broadband, which will bring even faster speeds to around two-thirds of UK premises by the end of 2014.

BT has already announced that fibre broadband will come to Barrow-in-Furness, Dalton-in-Furness and Workington later this year, and during 2013 to Maryport and Whitehaven.

For further information about this news release please contact the BT regional press office on 0800 085 0660. All our news releases can be read at www.bt.com/news

Note to Editors
*Once an exchange area has been upgraded for next generation broadband, some service providers automatically upgrade their customers to the enhanced broadband service. People should contact their chosen service provider for more information about the products and services they offer.