Virgin Media has joined forces with Chiltern District Council in the U.K. to blanket Chesham’s high street with super-fast Wi-Fi. The unlimited service is available to all 21,000 residents and businesses in the town as well as visitors passing through the center.
The Smart Pavement enables those in the area to ‘streetsurf’ with speeds of up to 166Mbps, which is seven times the average U.K. broadband speed. This discreet street furniture connects directly to Virgin Media’s fibre network to provide Wi-Fi via a submerged access point stored underneath a specially developed resin cover. These access points are rainproof and use a mix of the latest technology including fibre optic cabling and superior DOCSIS 3 tech.
Users can easily connect to the network by selecting “Virgin Media Wi-Fi” in the Wi-Fi settings on their device. Virgin Media mobile customers with an Android device will be able to access it seamlessly through the Virgin Media Wi-Fi Buddy app.
People in the area will be able to take advantage of this superfast Wi-Fi to streetsurf when they are out and about. They can download an episode of their favorite TV show while they wait at the bus stop, with a download speed of under 35 seconds assuming a file size of 634Mb. They will also save money on their mobile phone bill by reducing the amount of mobile data they use.
Virgin Media chose to implement this super-fast Wi-Fi service in Chesham because the local authority is actively engaged in trying to find ways to enhance the area for residents and businesses. Chesham is demographically representative of the U.K. population as a whole and its size enables quick deployment of services across the whole town. Gregor McNeil, Managing Director of Consumer at Virgin Media, said:
“Not only is this the first time we’ve built metropolitan WiFi directly from our street cabinets, it is also the UK’s first deployment of a WiFi connected pavement. It is literally public WiFi under your feet. We want to build more networks like this across the UK and encourage more forward thinking councils just like Chesham to get in touch.”
Read more at: Virgin Media
