Virgin Media is rolling out ultrafast fibre to the home (FTTH) of 30 more communities in the United Kingdom (UK). The recipients were decided by vote, of local residents and businesses.
The communities, which will see fibre broadband delivered directly to premises, are expected to be connected by spring 2017.
The initiative is part of Virgin Media’s Project Lightning network expansion. Local residents and businesses were urged to vote for their community to be one of the first to benefit from the scheme and bring the fastest widely available broadband speeds to their area. The voting was paused temporarily at the end of April to announce the first ten communities which received the most votes.
Since then homes and businesses across the country have been campaigning locally for Virgin Media to connect their street, with over 5,000 votes cast between 29 February and 30 June via the Cable My Street website. The next 30 communities are listed on the Virgin Media website here.
Residents and businesses who take the Virgin Media service in these communities will be connected with fibre broadband run directly to their property offering what Virgin describes as: ‘ultrafast , future-proof connectivity.’
Paul Buttery, chief operating officer at Virgin Media, said: “By bringing fibre to the parishes and smaller communities, it shows that ultrafast broadband and top-notch TV isn’t just for big cities. We have been overwhelmed by the response from the local communities and, as a result, we have decided to speed up our network expansion plans, to connect the next 30 villages by spring 2017. But we won’t stop there – we urge more people to come forward and tell us where we should expand to next.”
