Westminster City Council has struck a deal for full fibre broadband connections in its social housing.
It is part of an arrangement with G.Network, an internet service provider for the London area, to connect all housing in the borough over the next three years.
The initiative will reach over 1,800 buildings and nearly 20,000 flats.
Councillor David Harvey, cabinet member for housing, said, “Westminster City Council is committed to building a smart city by investing in new technology to enhance services and improve the lives of our residents.
“I am therefore proud to be working in partnership with G.Network to roll out full fibre broadband across all social housing in Westminster, ensuring all residents have access to a fast, reliable broadband connection.”
The company began to build its network for businesses and private rented properties in Westminster in 2017, at which point only 10% had access to full fibre and the average download speed was just 23Mbps. The latter figure has now almost doubled to 45Mbps as G.Network has installed broadband to over 160km of streets and dug past 80,000 premises.
It is building the network on an open access basis, which means other internet service providers ill be able to use the infrastructure.
Image from iStock, peterschreiber.media
