By Natasha Lomas, 8 May 2008 12:23
NEWS
The race to become the UK's first 'Fibrecity' has been won by the seaside resort of Bournemouth, better known for ice-cream and old people than high speed internet.
H2O Networks, a company that lays fibre optic cabling in the sewers, said work will begin to hook up every house and business in Bournemouth in the next six months - enabling speeds of up to 100Mbps. The project will cost around £30m and will be the largest of its kind in Europe, according to H2O.
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Uses of the network will include real-time traffic monitoring via CCTV, improved IT in schools and videoconferencing to help social workers carry out their jobs more effectively. The network may also give a boost to flexible working by enabling more people to work from home.
Bournemouth Borough Council is no stranger to a high fibre diet - H2O laid sewer fibre as a back-up network for the council last year.
The town was one of three in the running to be first to get H2O's full fibre treatment, along with Dundee and Northampton.
Comments
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1. Ralph
That's amazing. What's the point of puting in high-speed links for a town full of wrinklies? Everyone knows that wrinklies don't need high-speed connections, that's a young persons requirement.
Not sure about that ice-cream claim though. They make ice-cream in the New Forest and on the Isle of Wight but not in Oldsville.
2. anonymous
Ice-cream and old people hmm....
Have you ever been to Bournemouth?
It is home to many big players in the UK financial and insurance sectors. As for the old people I would say it is more famous for it's stag-do's and hen nights!
3. anonymous
In addition to this, C4L.co.uk will be running 100 Gbps of connectivity into Bournemouth prior to this service going live. We have plans to increase this to 800 Gbps when required (enough to run 400,000 homes on 100Mbps 50:1 ratio) which will significantly increase connectivity in Bournemouth and the local area. The core of this service will be at our Bournemouth data centre which will be launched later in the year.
4. luke flegg
I'm one of 18,000 students living in bournemouth. Then there's post grads still here, and the other college/secondary school students & other young people..
Bournemouth's alive. There's about 5 high streets full of clubs, pubs, bars and events. It's cheap.. I don't get what all this about old people is