Construction of the National Broadband Network has begun in a bid to unburden residents and business from lagging internet speeds, amid ongoing reports of Telstra outages.
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Workers have begun to connect more than 22,500 Wagga premises to the NBN, with most homes and businesses promised fast broadband internet before Christmas.
That promise of 50 megabits per second will come as welcome relief for Forrest Hill resident Matt Becket who has joined a growing chorus of Telstra customers to report intermittent internet connectivity.
“I’ve recently upgraded to Telstra’s premium package of a terabyte per month, but it’s constantly cutting out,” Mr Becket said.
“I'm certain the problem’s on Telstra’s end because friends of mine in Forrest Hill had the same problem with their internet cutting out all the time before changing over to Westnet and they haven’t a problem since.
“My only option is to leave work four hours early to meet a Telstra worker so they can have a look at it.”
A Telstra spokesman has denied the city’s ailing exchanges were to blame for reports of untenable upload and download speeds.
“We are unaware of any widespread issues affecting ADSL speeds in and around Wagga,” the spokesman said.
“The network is performing well and there are available ports for new ADSL connections in most areas.
“A range of factors may impact the speeds individual customers can experience on their DSL connection.
“The distance a customer is from their exchange, the time of day or night and the number of users accessing the Internet at the same time can all potentially impact the speed of a customer’s connection.”
Not all Wagga suburbs will have fast internet by December 25, with notorious broadband blackholes Bourkelands, Kooringal, Lake Albert, Springvale, Tatton and Tolland being forced to wait until at least July next year.
Nevertheless, residences in the city’s north will be among the first two million of a proposed eight million connections by 2020.
“This is great news for locals who will soon be able to rival people in the city when it comes to internet speed and reliability,” an NBN spokeswoman said.
“They join nearly 3000 homes and businesses in outlying areas that are already able to access the network through our fixed wireless technology.”
