Steady progress with ultra-fast broadband

Communications infrastructure company Chorus appears to be making steady progress in the roll-out of ultra-fast broadband (UFB) in the Wakatipu area.

The Government's most recent quarterly report on the roll-out of UFB showed it to be 44% complete in Otago and Southland after three years of the five-year programme.

Chorus spokesman Steve Pettigrew said the company expected to complete the roll-out in the wider Queenstown area by mid-2016.

''The year-five areas are due to be built sometime between July 2015 and June 2016, but the schedule has not yet been developed and so we're unable to give more detail on this.''

The fibre network was completed in central Queenstown and Frankton last year.

Cable installation now under way in the Frankton Rd area and along Peninsula Rd would continue into next year, and would begin by next June in Fernhill and Sunshine Bay.

Ducting for UFB had been completed for Wakatipu High School, Queenstown Primary School, St Joseph's School, KingsView School and Remarkables Primary School, but Remarkables was the only school to have connected so far, Mr Pettigrew said.

The remaining schools in the Wakatipu area, Arrowtown School and Glenorchy School, were covered by the Government's rural broadband initiative (RBI).

Arrowtown School was connected in 2012, while Glenorchy School was now in the process of being upgraded.

Vodafone external communications consultant Jenny Keown said the company was tasked with upgrading four existing cell sites in the Queenstown Lakes district as part of the RBI programme.

The sites - Queenstown-Frankton, Wanaka, Glenorchy and Arrowtown - had been completed, bringing high-speed wireless broadband to nearly 2700 addresses in the area.

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