Hillam Parish Council
Gigabit Broadband Project
This project plans to take advantage of the governments gigabit voucher scheme to
bring gigabit speed fibre broadband to our village. The scheme pays up to £1500 for residents and up to £3500 for businessess who register and "pledge" their voucher to the scheme. We aim to raise enough awareness, that we have enough engaged residents to ensure that the entire cost of installation is covered by the voucher scheme.
We have canvassed via questionnaires on social media where we have had a slow but generally positive response. BT Openreach have assessessed the level of interest and indicated that around 376 properties would benefit from this upgrade. An initial figure of around £200k has been quoted and this should be covered if we have 140 approx residents register and "pledge" their voucher.
The Openreach "pledge" site is not active yet - watch this space, but to date we have approximately 117 residents actively interested and climbing... we are almost there.... but the more the merrier.
We are also doing a flyer drop to target those who have not responded to digital channels.
What do YOU need to do
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Check if your postcode is covered by the scheme - you can also find out how the vouchers work, go to https://gigabitvoucher.culture.gov.uk/
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Register your interest and assist us in delivering this project by registering your completing our survey here
and commiting to "pledge" your voucher to the project.
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When we have enough numbers in the village, we can confirm go ahead with the contractor. They will then publish their "voucher portal" where you will then confirm that YOU are happy for your voucher to be used with the Hillam scheme.
Beyond that, there is not much more for you to do. The more people we have registered,the easier it will be to get the voucher commitals as we approach D-Day for the project.
An alternative provider has emerged locally who will provide similar (if not better) upload and download speeds via a wireless network across the village. More details can be found here. This is an excellent alternative if your postcode is not covered by the scheme and could potentially also be utilised for our various outdoor events where there is often no suitable internet coverage. The company suggest we need around 50 interested residents to make this a viable option. We have 30 so far interested in this wireless mesh option.
Regular updates will be provided via the Hillam Parish Council Facebook Page
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Twitter users can follow our tweets here
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