How 'abandoned' locals installed their own broadband

High-speed internet and information at our fingertips is now commonplace, but there are still areas of England where people struggle to connect.

One of those places was the Surrey Hills, until in 2018 a group of locals chose to take action and began researching how to lay their own fibre optic broadband.

Anthony Townsend, from Cranleigh, said major broadband providers would not supply the area because so few people lived there, so he founded Broadband for Surrey Hills (B4SH).

The group soon began laying underground cabling in fields and has now connected more than 600 properties to superfast fibre optic broadband.

The idea was first used by Barry Forde, from Broadband for Rural North, who was laying fibre optic cable to thousands of homes without internet in Cumbria.

Mr Forde gave his designs to Mr Townsend for free to be used in Surrey.

"The major companies just don't want to know, it's just in the 'too hard' category'," said Mr Townsend.

"Our original target was 600 connections and we've met that, but quite honestly we need to do more.

"The next few years are going to be very exciting. We've no aspiration to become a national network but the Surrey Hills is quite a big place."

During the pandemic, the benefits of the B4SH project were clear.

Reverend Tim Heaney, the rector of United Benefice of Shere, Albury and Chilworth, said it meant he could keep running church services.

"Lockdown turned most of us into broadcasters," he said.

"Big churches were already videoing and broadcasting services, but certainly very few of us in rural areas were."

Rev Heaney explained that he would record a service the day before it was needed as it would take all night to to YouTube - but with the new internet connection from B4SH he was able to stream it as it happened.

"I was amazed when I moved here, an hour from London, that the phone signal is appalling and the 4G is terrible, as was the broadband," he added.

It comes as the Digital Poverty Alliance launches a campaign on Tuesday to tackle "digital poverty and exclusion".

Elizabeth Anderson, CEO of the alliance, said: "Digital poverty in the UK is solvable, but only if we act decisively, and together.

"Ending digital poverty means making bold, practical commitments, and delivering on them.

"From investing in local solutions to holding sectors able for delivery, this plan is a call to all of us – government, industry, and communities – to do more, and do it now."

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