Monday, January 30, 2017

Progressing Forward Again

Openreach needs to do two pieces of work to get the new fibre connection to the Call Flow cabinet.  The first of these tasks is to run the fiber itself and this has been scheduled for this week.  The second piece of work is to repair some of the ducting.   This work should be getting scheduled this week.  Obviously it is this second piece of work that is going to dictate when we can see fibre in Temple to which Call Flow can connect us.

Fingers Crossed.

Tuesday, January 17, 2017

Not so Happy News

Below is an update from Openreach in regards to their efforts to get fibre to our new cabinets.

Unfortunately they have hit issues with both of the paths they can run along.  There is a blockage in the conduit in the first case and in the second the landowner along Temple Lane is asking for more compensation than Openreach are willing to offer (presumably because the other route would be less expensive even with all the extra works required).   Here is the text of the update from Andy Hudson of Openreach.

Will, Roger

With reference to the installation for Call Flow Solutions to serve your community.

I know you are eagerly awaiting the delivery of your solution and I thought I would provide you with an update.  This is more detail than we would usually provide but in the interest of good community relations I am happy to keep you informed.  Our customer for the solution is Call Flow Solutions and I have asked that they too get the same update too via their commercial team on copy.

The route via the farmers’ fields seems unlikely to progress as the farmer is seeking higher levels of compensation than we would support.  I do not have the details but our planning and wayleaves team are continuing to see if they can secure this option with the landowner. Helen Monroe on our side is leading this element and has everyone’s details following the site meeting.

The route down the road with the existing duct has a section that is not passable and requires replacing.  This necessitates building a joint box in the road or verge and laying new duct with a road closure.  This is being planned and the necessary permits and applications prepared.  I will inform you when we get traffic permit dates back.

We have applied for lane closures on the A404 to access our boxes along the main route as all the boxes are manholes in the main carriageway.

We will continue to complete or attempt as much work as is possible in parallel.

I should have some information or road closure dates etc within a week and I will drop you a note when I have more details.

Regards

Andy

The net impact of the above is a delay of anywhere from a couple weeks to several months (or more based on our record so far with this project).

I am hoping that someone in our community knows Mr. Randall well enough to reach out to him on behalf of the village.  It would be nice to know that he is aware that this project is not being driven by profitability for BT but by the government on behalf of his neighbors who campaigned relentlessly for a year to get it approved!

Wednesday, January 11, 2017

Happy High Speed New Year

It is the new year and things are starting to happen in earnest relative to our broadband speed upgrade!

Earlier this week Call Flow's new DSLAM (digital subscriber line access multiplexer) cabinet  was installed on top of the concrete pad that was put in place during December.  This is the cabinet that will contain the electronics that will get us on the super fast broadband that Call Flow will be offering shortly.


Once that cabinet appeared I notified BT Openreach (at their request) that it had been installed (hopefully they also had heard this from Call Flow)!  The very next day Openreach began the process of connecting the copper that will be our bridge between our phone lines (in their new cabinet) and the superfast connections in the new Call Flow cabinet.

The fibre connection is proceeding as well.  BT Openreach are pursuing two paths in parallel.  One path would come from a fibre pickup point near the exit to Temple on the 404 down the conduit the provides us with our phone service.  The downside of this path is that the conduit is crowded, though not at capacity, and the nature of the path into our valley is such that it may also have gotten silted up over time (creating a challenge for the running of our fibre).  Work on this path is set to begin on the 14th of January.

Given the possible issues with the above path a second option is also being pursued.  This option would take fibre from a pickup point close to the beginning of Temple Lane and trench it from there, down Temple Lane, and ultimately to the new cabinet that has just been installed.  There is a meeting on the 16th to discuss this approach with the landowner.

In the meantime we will be waiting for power to be supplied to the new Call Flow cabinet.  This has been ordered for mid February.  We have been informed that all setup activities can still be completed by Call Flow without power to the cabinet, however, for subscribers to gain access to the cabinet the power will need to be there!

All of the above is good news for a change.   In an ideal world we will not need the backup path for the fibre connection and we could have fibre to the new Call Flow cabinet in the coming days (or worst case week or two).  At that point it will be up to Call Flow to get their infrastructure working.  Continuing in the ideal world scenario this could mean that we might see high speed broadband available in February.