Update: NBN Co names 14 mainland sites
- 09 July, 2010 09:00
- Comments 9
NBN Co has announced 14 new sites in mainland Australia to receive fibre to the premises, bringing the total to 19.
According to NBN Co CEO, Mike Quigley, each site will have around 3000 residences. The installation of fibre would be completed after consultation with local councils.
The sites include Bacchus Marsh and South Morang in Victoria; inner north Brisbane; Springfield Lakes and Toowoomba in Queensland, and Gungahlin in the ACT.
Modbury and Prospect in South Australia are also included, along with Riverstone and Coffs Harbour in NSW; Victoria Park; Geraldton and Mandurah in Western Australia and Casuarina in the Northern Territory.
Quigley said the councils representing the first five sites in mainland Australia had been happy to see them, but had occasionally wanted to modify which streets and buildings got connected.
“It’s not a question of the council’s dictating,” he said. “They will have issues they may want to take into account, we’ve got a lot of engineering and planning issues and I think together we can come to a good outcome for everyone.”
He also said the inclusion of Gungahlin was partly thanks to community dissatisfaction over its poor Internet coverage.
“I’d say it certainly is a factor in our consideration,” he said. “It’s clear Gungahlin has a problem - it has a bunch of RIMs serving large parts of it, they can’t provide broadband.
“So it makes good sense if you can pick an area in the ACT to pick one that’s got problems with broadband.”
The five existing rollout locations set to be expanded include Minnamurra/Kiama Downs and Armidale in NSW, Townsville in QLD, Brunswick in Victoria and Willunga in South Australia.
The construction of the second release site is set for Q2, 2011. Although Quigley left the door open to using Telstra’s ducts and infrastructure, he claimed it would be dependent on a deal being signed with the Telco giant.
Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, said work was also continuing on the NBN regional backbone blackspots program, with 1100km of the planned 6000km already rolled out.
Nominations for the 2012 ARN IT Industry Awards open on Tuesday, June 12.
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Comments
Choked
Who cares which sites are the first ones on the NBN... probably won't get a live service for a while... just getting my hopes up here!
Justin
Why are they focusing on cities again? They already have fast broadband meanwhile us people in the country suffer with copper wire. This is major BS.
wat
Not exactly sure why the people from the bush keep complaining about poor services, noone told you to live so damn far away from civilization.
Lolz
Isn't that what the blackspot project was all about? Giving better broadband service to bush people? Stop complaining! =P
Jas
I'm curious as to why the sites that were chosen for WA were chosen.
Victoria Park.. ok. Not a bad move.
The ghetto that is Mandurah - nobody there would be able to afford to use the NBN once it goes live.
Geraldton - is primarily retirees - so nobody would probably want to use it once it goes live. Not to mention that it really is the sticks and in the middle of nowhere.
Jason
Very poor choice for WA, Vic Park has a bunch of fibre already under the failed Western Power/Bright scheme, I am guessing this is why they were selected.
Mandurah is a bunch of bums who are mostly unemployed or retirees who wouldn't care for the service and the same for Geraldton, I guess it gives them something to do.
What they shoud be doing is thinking about all the people that live around the cities (majority of the population) that can't get internet due to RIMS or old phone lines, four suburbs within a five to ten minute drive from the city (Perth) I couldn't get ADSL at all!
Ryan
Reply to Jas & Jason
"The ghetto that is Mandurah - nobody there would be able to afford to use the NBN once it goes live."
"Mandurah is a bunch of bums who are mostly unemployed or retirees who wouldn't care for the service and the same for Geraldton, I guess it gives them something to do."
I'd hate to be the one to tell you this but Mandurah isn't as bad as you think, yeah there are a few retirees and a lot of unemployed people, but for those of us who want decent speed broadband, the best we can get is 1.5mbit or 8mbit using Telstra gear on already overloaded exchanges that companies wont spend money upgrading (Due to the fact that the NBN is nearing).
The newer areas within Mandurah can't even get broadband because the exchanges are full. No one thought that Mandurah's population would grow as fast as it has, and the infrastructure wasn't designed to provide fast broadband to this many households, this is why NBN has been chosen to upgrade Mandurah.
If its bums and unemployment you want to poke a stick at, take a look at Warnbro/Rockingham. But look, they have ADSL2+ in most of their areas anyway.
Jeremy
Justin, there are plenty of city areas where "broadband" is not available at all, not reliable, not fast, or some combination of the above. I know two people who live in the Modbury area who can't get ADSL (at any speed) and where the Telstra/Foxtel cable service is somewhat variable. In my own home, which falls within the Prospect area (I think -- it's certainly on the Prospect telephone exchange) the ADSL is not particularly fast and tends to drop out completely during heavy rain.
Providing internet connectivity is only one of the aims of the early roll-out. They also want to test and evaluate the rollout process (without repeating the cable debacle of the 1990s).
Jebus
I'm just in the edge of the area for the Brunswick, VIC test site and I can't wait for this to get installed and testing. I'm in a block of flats on a busy commercial road and we don't have phone lines coming in to the building - don't get me started on how much I've tried to get this fixed via my estate agent and landlord. As a result I have to use 3G mobile broadband for which I pay $40 to get 6gb at - for the majority of the time - dial-up speeds.
Bring on the NBN ASAP!!!
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