The towns that will get NBN upgrade first

The government reveals which towns will be first to receive faster internet under $3.5bn upgrade to the National Broadband Network.

Josh Pritchard and Timmy Peau work on the NBN rollout.

The rollout has begun of local fibre networks in select regional and suburban areas in an effort to get the $3.5bn NBN upgrade underway, says federal Communications Minister Paul Fletcher.

Speaking at a CommsDay telecommunications industry event on Tuesday, Mr Fletcher said NBN Co has “commenced work with its construction delivery partners to design and construct local fibre networks passing around 100,000 premises in areas currently serviced by fibre to the node technology”.

The areas to be connected first in NSW are Belmont North, Charlestown, Toronto, Carramar, Castle Hill, Holsworthy, Liverpool and Wetherill Park.

In Victoria, Lyndhurst and Narre Warren will be hooked up, as will Osborne in South Australia.

In Queensland Acacia Ridge, Browns Plains, Eight Mile and Oxenford will be connected, as will Cannington and Double View in Western Australia.

Construction of the initial local fibre networks in these locations is expected to be completed in the second half of next calendar year, Mr Fletcher said, with the ultimate goal of covering two million premises by the end of 2023.

The rollout represents the first step in a plan to provide broadband speeds of up to one gigabit per second to eight million households via fibre on a demand-led basis.

Under the plan, existing fibre to the node networks will be expanded and households and businesses will have the option to upgrade to a full fibre lead into their premises if they order a high-speed plan.
NBN said it would work with internet retailers over the coming months to define a process by which customers can register their interest for higher speed broadband or a fibre to the premises connection.

The government will also upgrade capacity for the 2.5m premises connected to the hybrid fibre coaxial network.

Mr Fletcher said the initial rollout did not indicate the scope of the full upgrade.

“It is important to emphasise this initial footprint represents only 5 per cent of the build program and is not indicative of the wider footprint in terms of representation across states and territories or regional and metro areas,” he said.

“But what this next phase of network investment does represent is momentum.”

Economic stimulus

Mr Fletcher said the move would act as economic stimulus in the first instance and then act as an economic multiplier as the upgrades are carried out, enhancing Australia’s digital economy at a time where online connectivity is more central to our lives than ever before.

“We are getting on with the job now, with a particular early focus in the states, and in regional and metro areas where we anticipate strong demand,” Mr Fletcher said.

“Where NBN have established construction and delivery partners that are well resourced with good people who are ready to work; where we can deploy with speed and agility; where it is cost-effective to start work now – and in a way that we can spread and multiply economic activity across the nation.”
NBN Co CEO Stephen Rue said he anticipated high demand for faster internet plans, with 55,000 customers upgrading their internet plan in 2020 alone.
“We see this demand for higher speed broadband services accelerating in the years ahead as more people connect more devices within their homes, and we continue to automate our homes, which inevitably requires faster download and upload speeds and greater capacity to be built into the network,” he said.

Under the plan $2bn will be spent upgrading regional Australia’s connection to the NBN network with 950,000 homes and businesses in the bush to gain access to 1gb speeds.

A total of 240 “business fibre zones” will be established – 85 in regional areas – wherein businesses will gain cheaper access to NBN’s enterprise ethernet.

Businesses in these zones can get optical fibre connected with no upfront change and will pay the same for a plan as a business in a major city’s CBD.

Mr Fletcher said the network upgrade proved the efficacy of the Coalition’s NBN plan over Labor’s original model.

“We’ve announced the next stage in growth for NBN,” he said.

“This has been largely welcomed, except for a few fierce fibre partisans whose reactions reminded me of apocryphal Japanese soldiers found in the remote jungle in the 1950s, refusing to believe that WWII was over.”