Monyash was enabled for “superfast” broadband early in the summer of 2015. As long as you are not too far from the “street cabinet”, you should be able to get fast broadband from your Internet Service Provider (ISP). You can check your own availability by visiting the OpenReach checker here.
OpenReach maintains the cabling and exchanges in the telephone network. They used to be part of the BT Group of companies, but they are now completely separate and have nothing to do with selling phone and internet services to consumers.
Superfast broadband is delivered using a fibre-optic connection (often abbreviated to fibre) from the exchange to a metal box called a street cabinet. For Monyash, our exchange is in Bakewell, and the street cabinet is just out of the village, on the verge of the road above the end of Lathkill Dale. All the connections to properties in Monyash, for phone and internet services, come from that street cabinet.
What service a property can get depends, among other factors, on its distance from the street cabinet. If your property can’t get superfast broadband, you may be able to get a slower service over your existing phone line, using a technology called ADSL. If that is too slow for you, or if you can’t even get that, then you may be able to get an internet connection using either a satellite-based service or a wireless provider. We don’t offer advice or recommendations, so you will need to do some research.
However, we do know that one company, called W3Z, provides wireless internet in parts of Derbyshire using microwave transmitters and receivers – and they have extended their network to include Monyash. If you want to talk to them, you can find their website here.
If you want to know what sort of service you are getting now, your ISP may well have a speed checker. There are independent speed checkers available, and one that is quite widely used is Speedtest from Ookla. The consumer organisation Which? also has a speed checker.
Fibre was installed for Monyash from a project run by Derbyshire County Council, as part of a Government initiative to deliver superfast broadband throughout the country. Find out more at Digital Derbyshire.