Articles (France – French language)
Fibre optique : la Gironde s’équipe mais Bordeaux prend du retard – DegroupNews.com
My Comments
In rural France, a département at a time for real Internet
Previously I have mentioned about Gironde being the location of a département-wide fibre-optic backbone rollout with an intention to reduce the digital divide that existed in that area. Now the rollout is underway with positive results coming through in that goal.
What is happening in Gironde
The fibre-optic trunks will allow more ADSL equipment to be in place thus enabling 7600 households who couldn’t to have Internet and 35000 more dial-up-modem or low-broadband households to have real proper broadband speeds.
There is public money involved with a public-private partnership with Orange. But the Gironde local government will persist on the project making sure real Internet service passes more households.
Delay with Bordeaux
But it is not all rosy at the moment. Bordeaux, the main economy in that area is being put back while the rest of the département is being covered with fibre-optic. Part of this is a presumption that there is full ADSL coverage in that city, but Bordeaux could benefit from next-gen broadband as much as anywhere else.
A main limitations is the competence of the bureaucracy concerning Bordeaux’s Internet rollout and this exposes the city to a two-tier risk as far as Internet service is concerned. This can be demonstrable with outer-urban growth corridors or resort spots that exist around the town. It can also extend to areas that may house lower socioeconomic classes But they hope to have Bordeaux covered with fibre-optic next-generation Internet by 2013.
Conclusion
In some countries, it may take a local-government area or a regional-government area to focus on Internet-enabling that area and it may have to be a public effort.
