The Assembly Member for Aberconwy, Janet Finch-Saunders AM, has been informed of a new scheme that Vodafone is launching to give indoor mobile coverage to up to 100 rural community hubs, from pubs to village halls and community-run shops, in mobile coverage not-spots across the UK.
Janet has been informed that the Community Indoor Sure Signal (CISS) programme is designed to provide reliable indoor 3G voice and data coverage and will be open to 100 rural community hubs, building on the Rural Open Sure Signal programme. The scheme is intended to compliment Vodafone's expected investment of £2 billion over the next three years on improving their network and services across the UK.
Following a successful pilot at the Bear and Ragged Staff pub in Bransford, near Worcester, Vodafone are now calling for applications from rural community centres such as independent or community-run pubs and shops, village halls, scout huts, doctors’ surgeries or visitor centres, that do not currently have reliable mobile coverage.
Successful applicants (who must be the broadband bill payer) will need an unlimited broadband package with download speeds of at least 4Mbps and upload speeds of 2Mbps and a domestic plug-in power point. The CISS unit simply plugs into a standard fixed broadband router to provide mobile coverage throughout a building, hall or shop.
Full information and application details are available here.