Communications minister Stephen Conroy yesterday announced the second round of locations for the rollout of the National Broadband Network.
It comes just days after the first customers in Tasmania were connected to the network, with ISPs including Internode, iiNet and Primus already offering plans with speeds up to 100Mbps.
Conroy, along with NBN Co. chief executive Mike Quigley, announced the network will now be expanded into 19 new areas:
Victoria – Bacchus Marsh, South Morang
Queensland – Inner North Brisbane, Springfield Lakes, Toowoomba
New South Wales – Riverstone, Coffs Harbour
South Australia – Modbury, Prospect
Western Australia – Victoria Park, Geraldton, Mandurah
Northern Territory – Casuarina
Australian Capital Territory – Gungahlin
These new locations will come alongside five additional rollout sites, which include Minnamurra/Kiama Downs and Armidale in New South Wales, Townsville in Queensland, Brunswick in Melbourne and Wilunga in South Australia.
These areas were named as the first five rollout sites back in March, but now they’re set to receive additional construction sites. First-stage construction will begin this month, but the newly announced areas will have to wait until the second quarter of 2011 before construction will begin.
“NBN Co’s consultation with local authorities in the delivery of these sites is further evidence of the importance it places on taking a cooperative approach to the rollout.”
“Ultimately, the NBN will provide all premises in Australia with affordable, high speed broadband, no matter where they are located.”
Quigley said the network design is based on building “blocks or modules”, from which other areas will be connected. These rollout areas are designed to feed into Fibre Serving Areas, which will allow ISPs to connect individual homes to the network.
“The first and second release sites are the areas from which we can expect to see future rollout – extending and expanding the network. We will also see the announcement of additional release sites as the national rollout ramps up,” Quigley said.
He also mentioned the NBN Co. is looking for areas where it can access Telstra’s ducts to lay fibre. The infrastructure can be used as part of the $11 billion deal between the two parties.
“Frankly, we don’t want to dig up the ground where we don’t need to,” he said. “It’s much better if we can use existing facilities.”
He also said specific rollout locations will depend on negotiations with councils. “It is not a question of the councils dictating, we will go through a consultation process,” he said.
“They will have issues and we have a lot of engineering and logistics factors to take into account, and I think together we will get a good outcome for everybody.”
Conroy said the new sites come after a successful initial rollout in parts of Tasmania, where some users are already connected to the network.
“Work on the NBN Regional Backbone Blackspots Program is progressing well with over 1,100 kms of the 6,000 kms of backbone fibre already rolled out,” he said.
Conroy also took yesterday’s announcement as an opportunity to attack the Coalition, which has repeatedly said it will scrap the NBN altogether if it wins the upcoming election.
“The Opposition is as backward-looking as you can get. If we simply said we should stop now because of the Opposition (policy), nothing would ever happen,” he said.
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
