The CDT is part of a consortium of valleys who are going through a long-winded process to apply for some of the Scottish Government's £40million fund to improve rural broadband.
Thank you to everyone who filled in the Broadband Survey and special thanks to the directors of the CDT who attempted to visit every house in the valley. Although exact figures have not yet been released, by my estimates we had nearly 60% of valley properties fill in the questionnaire.
Apparently, that's quite a good survey return rate.
The Southern Uplands Partnership (SUP) are coordinating the whole project and they were looking to get over 600 surveys returned across all the valleys. The good news is that we surpassed the 600 surveys. This means we have a viable base of demand for better broadband, to move to the next stage.
The next step is to produce a scoping document so that a tendering process can be started. As part of the process, the document is submitted to OpenReach, who then have the opportunity to take various postcodes out of the scope of the SUP project, by committing to provide superfast broadband to them.
My personal view is that, this will be the route to superfast broadband for a good proportion of valley residents. Those not adopted by OpenReach will continue down the SUP route.
The CDT will continue to update you on the latest information available on the website (www.borthwickwater.co.uk) and in the Valley Newsletter.