• County Broadband presentation at Village Hall CANCELLED

    County Broadband have regretfully had to cancel/postpone the presentation they were hosting at the Village Hall on Tuesday 10 September, because of illness.  Simon Biddulph will hope to reschedule for the near future.  More news when we have it.

  • County Broadband – Fibre broadband to the Home in Claxton

    As some of you may already know, a representative of County Broadband has been approaching parishioners regarding installing fibre broadband direct to homes in the village.

    Simon Biddulph is looking after Claxton. He can be contacted on 07946 169577 or at [email protected], where he will be able to answer any of your queries or questions.  He will be able to go through the offers available and see whether they meet individuals’ needs.

    County Broadband require 20% of the village (roughly 20 households) to sign up in order for them to provide this service to the whole village.  As part of this deal they will install fibre broadband direct to the Village Hall at no additional cost.

    District Councillor Vic Thomson confirmed this will be the quickest way for Claxton to get fibre broadband to the home, as there are no other companies coming to the village anytime in the near future.

    The Parish Council will have an agenda item on this at September’s meeting being held on Tuesday 19th.

       

  • Broadband in Claxton – the final phase

    Anyone passing Church Lane at Claxton Corner recently will have noticed the sign saying that Church Lane will be closed from 1-5 July for broadband-related work.  This is connected to the installation of the last of three fibre cabinets in the village.  This cabinet, No 8, will be located just round the first corner, not far from the entrance to Lambs Court.  See photos below.

    Some residents at Claxton Corner have already been connected to fibre broadband, taking their service from cabinet No 7 in Folly Lane.  Given that this cabinet is almost a mile from Claxton Corner, the download speeds they are “enjoying” are probably no more than 15Mps at the moment, though that is considerably higher than anything they received beforehand.  When the new cabinet goes live and they have asked their provider to be switched to it, they can expect speeds in excess of 50Mps, and other residents of Church Lane will also be able to get much higher speeds than at present.

    The exact timing of the installation has still not been announced.  As soon as we have something, it will appear on this website.

  • High-Speed Broadband here at last

    A few residents will already have been in touch with providers and one or two have already had high-speed internet services connected following the successful installation before Christmas.

    Two of the promised 3 roadside cabinets are now operational.  No 6 is just the other side of the Parish boundary in Ashby St Mary, at the junction of Chapel Road and Chapel Lane.  That serves the houses on Folly Lane.

    No 7 is a little way down Folly Lane from its junction with The Street and serves the majority of the village.  Because the links from the Thurton exchange to the cabinet are now fibre-optic, the signal emerging from the cabinet is much stronger.  Though designed to meet the needs of households up to just short of the Manor, in practice residents on Claxton Corner (and even some way up Church Lane) will be able to get higher speeds, though the installation later this year of the third cabinet (No 8) should improve the speed at that end of the village dramatically.

    The easiest way to check whether you are covered by either of the two cabinets which are live is to use this link BT Checker.  The best way to search is by entering your telephone number and pressing Submit.

    You should then get a chart something like the one below which your Site Manager got when using his own number.  If high-speed broadband is available you will have entries labelled VDSL as shown below inside the red circle.  In this case BT are saying I can get speeds of up to 80Mps, which is around 20 times my current speed.  ADSL identifies much slower copper based broadband.

    This improved service does not come without extra cost however.  You will need to either negotiate with your current provider or use one of the comparison sites to see which companies offer such services in Claxton, and at what price.

  • Better Broadband for Claxton – things are happening

    We have just had confirmation from the Better Broadband for Norfolk (BBfN) programme that the location for the first of 3 fibre cabinets for Claxton has been agreed.  It will go into the grass verge a short way down Folly Lane.  Anyone walking or driving past this point will see a lot of coloured paint on the road and a small red sign in front of the boundary fence of Grey Gables, marked AIO (which means an All In One cabinet).

    It would normally have gone in alongside the BT junction box in the pavement outside The Folly, but the pavement at that point is simply too narrow.

    We’ve also just learned that this cabinet will serve 68 properties, so that means all the houses on The Street at least up to the Manor, and including Claxton Mill.  Remember we are expecting 2 further cabinets, one near the end of the year and one in 2019, which I expect will cover Claxton Corner and Church Lane as well as the properties in Folly Lane, but THIS IS ALL subject to confirmation nearer the time.

    That’s all we know at present.  Further news will be put on the website as it arrives.  What it does mean is that the service for which many of us have been campaigning for over 5 years is just that little bit closer to starting.

  • New Letter to Richard Bacon MP about rural broadband

    At its meeting on 13 January the Parish Council agreed a proposal for a fresh letter to our Member of Parliament, Richard Bacon, to draw his attention to the village’s position on broadband, and its disappointment that the “alternative solution” for Claxton will end up being considerably more expensive than traditional solutions.  This puts rural locations such as Claxton at a major disadvantage compared to those urban and rural locations (including neighbouring Loddon and Chedgrave) which are enjoying the benefits of super-fast broadband through fibre-optic connections at much lower costs than for satellite broadband.  The Clerk wrote to Mr Bacon on 19 January and his letter appears below.  It has been acknowledged by Mr Bacon’s office. Clerk-Broadband-letter-to-Richard-Bacon-MP-2016-1

  • Broadband in Claxton: Reply from Richard Bacon MP

    At its meeting on 17 September, the Parish Council approved the draft letter from the Parish Clerk to Richard Bacon MP, drawing his attention to the poor internet service enjoyed by Claxton residents, and the low level of confidence that this will be fixed by the Better Broadband for Norfolk Project.  A copy of Mr Bacon’s reply is below.Richard Bacon reply

Cookies For Comments Image