All mapped out
BT has also announced 159 new fast fibre broadband locations across the UK, covering over one million homes and businesses.
North East: 17,500 homes and businesses are set to get fibre-based broadband as Ponteland, Prudhoe and Hougton-le-Spring will be upgraded by Autumn 2011, taking the total number of North East homes and businesses able to access super-fast broadband to around 115,500.
North West: 133,000 homes and business will be hooked up to BT's fibre optic broadband network in Autumn 2011. Areas will include: Accrington, Allerton, Bamber Bridge, Blackfriars, Broughton, Caldy, Fulwood, Higher Bolton, Holmes Chapel, Hooton, Irby, Irlam, Liverpool central, Longton in Lancashire, Manchester central, Mountwood, Neston, Ormskirk, Ringway, Royal in Liverpool, Wallasey and Westhoughton. Once the work is done some 895,000 homes and businesses in the region should be covered.
West Midlands: 53,000 homes and businesses will get access to super fast broadband in Autumn of next year in: Birmingham Central, Chapel End in Nuneaton, Donnington, Four Oaks, Headless Cross, Hillside, Shirley, Southam and Streetly bringing the total number of homes able to get next generation internet in the region to 453,000.
Scotland: 33,000 homes and businesses are set to get upgrades by Autumn 2011, including: Dunblane; Dundee Park; Fountainbridge, Newington and Waverley exchanges in Edinburgh and parts of Mid Calder in West Lothian, bringing the total number of Scottish homes and businesses able to access super-fast broadband to around 134,000.
Wales: 18,200 homes and businesses will also get the upgrade in the same time frame including: Caldicot, Llantwit Major, Mumbles and Pencoed. This will mean around 178,500 Welsh homes and workplaces will be able to get super-fast broadband.
South East: 274,000 more homes and businesses in the South East will be able to access fibre-based broadband by Autumn 2011 in: Buckingham, Reigate, Southampton, Thames Ditton and Weybridge among others, taking the total to 1,683,300 homes in the South East region.
Openreach will carry out the upgrades and the technology will be available on an open, wholesale basis to all companies providing broadband services. BT's investment programme aims to deliver fibre broadband to up to two thirds of the UK for around £2.5bn.
A BT spokesperson said: "We want to extend the fibre footprint and the benefits it brings to the final third of the UK where the economics pose a major challenge, but this will require a collective effort. An infrastructure project on this scale...can only be done in partnership. We're keen to talk to public and private sector organisations about how this can be achieved."
