Bradford community signs deal with BT to bring high-speed broadband to residents

A partnership between local residents and Openreach, BT’s local network business, is to make high-speed broadband available to 130 households in a Bradford community.

Openreach will install new fibre optic cabling and Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) technology for the project at Burwood Heights, Queensbury.

The entire cost of delivering the new technology has been covered by investment from Openreach and the UK Government’s Better Broadband Subsidy Scheme, which supports households and businesses not covered by any current fibre broadband rollout plans and who get speeds below 2Mbps

The new network, which offers download speeds of up to 80Mbps**, will be particularly welcomed by households wanting to connect several devices to the internet at the same time. Whether it’s downloading the latest TV box sets, Skyping friends and family, shopping or researching online, speedy access to the internet has never been more important.

The co-funded deal at Burwood Heights is expected to see the first residents get the higher speeds within the next 12 months. It is part of BT’s Community Fibre Partnerships programme, which has already seen BT sign agreements with more than 200 local communities and organisations to bring fibre broadband to some of the UK’s most challenging areas.

Burwood Heights resident David Gibson, who led the campaign for the upgrade, said: “Broadband speeds are more important now than ever before. Improving our internet speed is going to make a massive difference to people living here. Once the work is complete, the technology will better support those working from home, we will be able to stream many of the exciting TV shows we've not been able to watch and won’t have to wait hours to download software updates. Everyone in Burwood Heights is counting down the days until the upgrade.”

Tom Keeney, chairman of BT’s regional board in Yorkshire and the Humber, said: “We are working with communities, such as Burwood Heights, up and down the region. Rolling out fibre broadband to as many communities as possible is one of our top priorities and working directly with a group of residents like this is just one of the ways of making that happen. People here have shown great determination to go ahead with this exciting project. Fibre broadband opens up endless opportunities for those living here.

“Our ambition is to ‘never say no’ to any community that wants superfast broadband, and we’re really pleased we found a way forward in Burwood Heights which testifies to that. We’re keen to have conversations with other communities who might benefit from this approach.”

Kim Mears, Openreach’s managing director for infrastructure delivery, said: “It is great to be able to work with communities like Burwood Heights to find a fibre broadband solution. We’re working on hundreds of similar community fibre partnership programmes across the UK, which are bringing faster fibre internet access to even more homes and businesses. Openreach is committed to making fibre broadband as widely available as possible in the UK to allow families and businesses to do even more online.”

Openreach offers fibre broadband access to all service providers on an open, wholesale basis, which means that local households and businesses can benefit from competitive pricing and products from a wide range of providers.

More than nine out of ten premises across the UK can access superfast broadband speeds. For more details on the roll-out visit

https://www.homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/when-can-i-get-fibre.aspx

To find out how to help bring superfast broadband to your community visit

www.communityfibre.bt.com