Only one-sixth of the surveys required for the rollout of the National Broadband Plan in Clare have been carried out to date, even though the vast majority have been conducted in some other counties.
While over 22,500 premises here are due to be connected under the scheme, but only 3,500 have been surveyed to date, as Clare FM’s Josh Prenderville reports.
These surveys involves contractors for National Broadband Ireland physically checking poles, cables and ducts in areas due to be served by the plan.
It’s a key step of the design process of the overall plan, that is due to bring high-speed internet access to over 544,000 homes nationally, including 22,592 in Clare.
But of those homes in the Banner, surveys have only been carried out for 16%, the second lowest rate of any county.
The earliest survey works were concentrated in areas of East and South-East Clare, closest to Limerick.
The national average is 33%, while the majority of homes have been surveyed in five counties.
In two; Carlow and Louth, well over 90% of properties have been surveyed.
The figures will give rise to concern that the rollout of the national broadband plan here could be slower as a result.
National Broadband Ireland has confirmed the figures for Clare, but has stressed that they’ll invest 89 million on broadband here and that the rollout of fibre will be based on the principle that allows broadband be delivered to people as quickly as possible.
But if that rollout mirrors the survey work to date, it could mean a long wait for many parts of rural Clare.
A spokesperson for National Broadband Ireland said:
“The National Broadband Plan will see €89 million invested throughout County Clare – a very substantial investment. This will see the delivery of fibre infrastructure to 22,592 premises (33% of all premises in the county) and will enable e-learning, remote monitoring of livestock or equipment, e-health initiatives, better energy efficiency in the home, and more remote working. Additionally, the NBP sees the delivery of Broadband Connection Points (or BCPs) which are public locations that have been selected to receive high-speed connectivity in order to service rural communities ahead of the delivery of fibre to their homes.
National Broadband Ireland contractors have been on the ground in Clare since September 2020 working on design and surveying works. To date, across Clare and its townlands, 3,556 premises have been designed and surveyed. NBI have committed to a 7 year timeline for the deployment of the infrastructure that will underpin the National Broadband Plan and inherent in the timeline, is the fact that some communities will be deployed sooner than others. NBI will be surveying and building in all counties in 2021.
Critically our rollout is based on deployment strategy and engineering principles that allows us to get to all 544K premises as quickly as possible, working within the confines of how fibre networks are built and leveraging the existing infrastructure that is already in place.
On a country basis, NBI started physical work on the ground in January 2020 and despite the challenging environment caused by Covid-19, the company has grown and mobilised the team to have over 1,000 people working on the project, and to date have surveyed over 193,000 premises nationwide.
We encourage all end users to register their interest at www.nbi.ie/eoi and in doing so, they will receive specific information and relevant updates based on the appropriate deployment timeline.”
