£1m brings Internet into the 1990s
Article published: Tuesday, February 2nd 2010
With £1 million of high speed internet access coming to Manchester courtesy of the North West Regional Development Agency, where would you put it to do the most good? Ardwick, Rusholme, Longsight or Moss Side maybe? The answer might surprise you…
Does the University of Manchester really need public money for an internet system?
Perhaps one of the most deprived areas of Manchester which might actually benefit most from such an investment would be a worthy candidate for the development. Yet instead the investment is going right through the middle of all those places, it’s just passing down the so-called Corridor Manchester covering “1,000 homes and 500 businesses”.
Throughout its glossy brochure, Corridor Manchester – a partnership between the universities, Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and the City Council – talks about how it will bring high speed internet access from St Peter’s Square to Whitworth Park.
The announcement notes “the areas immediately surrounding Corridor Manchester – Ardwick, Rusholme, Moss Side and Hulme – are some of the most deprived neighbourhoods in the UK… these are vibrant and diverse communities with a great deal to offer to the economic and cultural life of the city”. But it would appear Corridor Manchester has nothing to offer them. However, this mention of deprivation probably comes in as a useful legitimisation for spending so much public cash.
Those behind the plan for the new network appear not to have thought about the actual content of the image they are promoting. The front page of the announcement imagines the benefit of all this futuristic data, showing connections exclusively to the various university buildings on part of Oxford Road. However, every single one of these buildings is currently connected to the UK academic network, and therefore already benefit from internet access at speeds faster than this investment will offer. The reality is that the buildings they picture have had these internet speeds since the decade before last.
It is worth remembering the Government’s pledge to connect the whole of the UK to broadband internet by 2012 in last year’s Digital Britain report. So you would be forgiven for asking why this not insubstantial sum of public money is being spent on a geographical area already well serviced, with little benefit to surrounding residential areas.
More: Manchester, News, QuickKick
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