£150 – 300 for getting connected – Read below for more details…
Sign Up at – https://b4rn.org.uk/postcode-checker/
We’re entering the New Year and a new stage of progress for B4TNR already. Our detailed Gigabit fibre broadband plan has just been approved for funding by the Government Department of Media, Culture and Sport (DCMS) for the parishes of Bavington, Birtley, Chollerton (inc Barrasford), Corsenside, Kirkwhelpington and Wallington!
This is HUGE news and has taken a HUGE amount of effort to get to this stage. Thankfully it will end up providing most of the funding for our area!
The most important thing to note from the video is this type of connection can be
any distance from the cabinet, perfect for our rural homes!
To secure the funding for the area though, individual households need to sign-up for these Government Vouchers and say you intend to use the service. This is different from our previous expression of interest (EOI) forms. These vouchers are ONLY paid out on delivery of the service – i.e. the gigabit fibre network is built to your property and you’re connected up, so they wouldn’t apply if we never got there (though we want to connect every home in your parish). B4RN float the funding themselves between building the network and you getting connected, and will only do so if they are confident of local demand. Signing up is the only way of informing us you want this service and we won’t waste money building to properties where we aren’t really wanted.
(If you’re new to all these acronyms B4RN is Broadband for the Rural North, our parent organisation – They run and manage the community fibre connection from the Lake District where their first community project began. B4TNR or Broadband for North Tyne and Redesdale are the local volunteer group who started almost a year ago to help plan and build the network with local people, landowners and farmers)
Also B4RN will pay out a “dig grant” to encourage you to sign-up,
on connection
B4RN will pay YOU!
Residential properties get £150
Businesses get £300 (sole-trader and up)
If you have another internet provider and are in a contract at the moment not to worry as there is a deferred sign-up option. The 12-month sign-up is government-imposed as part of the vouchers, but note B4RN as a responsible community benefit society has no penalties for leaving early – see all their terms and conditions at https://b4rn.org.uk/resources/ for more details.
We hope you are as eager, as we are to get quite literally the world’s best broadband in our local area. This is OUR ONE CHANCE to bring our rural internet in line with what Google Fiber is just now set-up in 9 major cities around the USA. The UK government refers to it as GOLD STANDARD Fibre to the Property (FTTP), more than that B4RN fibre is made to be future proof and not need endless upgrades in the coming decades. Your B4RN fibre-line is 100% yours and there is no sharing it with your neighbours. And regarding 5G – for it to work, it needs a fibre connection like this (though really 5G is designed for small highly populated city areas not rural ones).
How can I help?
There are many ways to help us get involved in the planning and construction of the network, you can offer to volunteer your time to help organise and even dig part of it! But equally important is raising funds to support the local deployment, you can invest in shares locally and you can request Government Vouchers.
We’re looking forward to starting to build our network this year, with your help we can!
Check out the details below and sign-up at the B4RN website.
Awesome post! Keep up the great work! 🙂