While the council does not own or have any direct control over digital investment, it can play a key role in facilitating the improvement of digital connectivity in the following areas:
- Full fibre to the premises broadband (FTTP)
- 4G and 5G mobile networks
Full fibre
The council will facilitate and support the rollout of ultrafast full fibre broadband for homes and businesses within the borough.
The council has signed a digital charter with Openreach. The partnership agreement follows Openreach’s aim to connect tens of thousands of homes and businesses in the borough and is part of an investment to improve digital infrastructure, bringing ultrafast, ultra-reliable, future-proof connectivity to much of the borough.
The charter sets out commitments made by both the council and Openreach, with the purpose of speeding up the delivery of Openreach’s full fibre deployment plans throughout Bromley. Commitments in the digital charter such as allowing for the application of retrospective highways permits, will grant Openreach the ability to streamline their planned works and ultimately allow them to connect more premises in less time.
Mobile connectivity
Mobile network operators are looking to rent space on council assets such as lamp columns to host 4G and 5G infrastructure such as small cells which increase capacity in a mobile network.
The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has published a Digital Infrastructure Toolkit, containing guidance and templates to assist local authorities to best manage the roll out of 4G and 5G infrastructure.
Market operators can submit Expressions of Interest (EOI) to the council to deploy their infrastructure in Bromley. The council will consider EOI’s individually and if requirements are met and satisfactory, an agreement will be made between Bromley Council and the mobile operator to deploy their infrastructure.