Village to get fast broadband this year

RATBY will be one of 10 places in the UK to benefit from Virgin Media’s ultrafast broadband expansion.

Communities were invited to vote to be one of the first to benefit from the £3 billion scheme, and influence decisions on where it was to begin.

More than 7,000 votes were cast between Monday February 29 and Fri- day April 29 via the Cable My Street website, where Ratby finished fourth in the top 10 list.

Jo Dutton, regional director for the Midlands at Vigin Media, said: “Congratulations to residents of Ratby on coming fourth place in our leader board. The support and interest from communities across the UK has exceeded our expectations and we’re delighted to be supercharging Ratby with ultrafast broadband and better entertainment. By investing and delivering better connectivity, it shows that ultrafast broadband isn’t just for the big cities.”

The expansion will cause minimal disruption using a method called narrow-trenching, which reduced the width of the trench to lay optical fibre cables from around 40cm to just 10cm and enable engineers to cover up to 100m in a day.

David Tredinnick, MP for Bosworth, said: “Fast and reliable broadband has become an everyday necessity for families, businesses, schools and practically every other aspect of modern life.”