BT’s Fibre Broadband Technology Pilot Impeded in North London
The broadband internetsavvy people in the UK find it unfortunate that the ongoing pilot of fibre optic broadband technology by BT in North London has been forced to apply skids. This was due to the protests of the local residents of Muswell Hill citing that the fresh roadside cabinets of BT was too large and ugly.
Following the disquiet, Haringey Council blocked the internet service provider from any further installation of the equipment on the Muswell Hill streets. It is also understood that the council strictly wants BT to reconsider its new 1.8 metre-tall cabinet network.
As a matter of fact, Muswell Hill holds the credit for being the first urban area in the UK, where BT is committed to replace its copper lines that connect the roadside fibre optic cabinets to its exchanges. This comes in line with BT’s GBP1.5 billion copper replacement scheme.
According to BT, most of its trial equipments were successfully installed and all set to run providing the customers up to 40Mbps downstream broadband speeds, before it had run into opposition from the residents.
The residents’ stance was explained by a Haringey Council spokesman, Mike Snowdon that they were already troubled by BT with its older roadside cabinets that were significantly tall and not removed to clear the way, and the new equipment was not only taller but also bulkier than the older ones.
Snowdon added that these cabinets had invited people’s complaints such as causing problems for wheelchair and buggies users, apart from being an eyesore. Meanwhile BT explained their part that the fresh cabinets needed to be bigger for requiring to house powered electronics.
According to the ISP, the powered electronics were significant as they converted the fibre optics transmitted light signals to electric signals in order to comply with the copper lines. However, the ISP maintained that its current full copper link network that linked homes to cabinets and to local exchanges needed no such conversion of power.
