It’s 2018 and if you’re unlucky enough to live in certain parts of Mudgee, you still can’t access the nbn.
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If you head to the nbn website, you can see where in Australia the nbn is currently available, the idea being that you check your address to see if you’re eligible.
If you search for ‘Mudgee’ you’ll see that almost all of Mudgee has access to either Fibre to the Node (FTTN) or Fixed Wireless options.
Look a little closer however and you’ll notice some very select areas of Mudgee are still in the ‘build commenced’ zone, represented by a brown area on the map.
A resident in a single street might be eligible for NBN while their neighbour might be connected already.
The Mudgee Guardian has been asked for some of our readers to look into why this is the case.
We contacted nbn and asked them why these nbn ‘dead zones’ exist and when can residents living in them expect to be online with the rest of Mudgee?
Nbn local manager for New South Wales, Amber Dornbusch answered our requests.
“We are currently rolling out to tens of thousands of homes across Australia every week. The dates provided on the rollout map are indicative only and we ask the Mudgee community for its patience as we make the transition from the old to the new network,”
“We are working to connect these areas in Mudgee as soon as we can. Nbn connects an area when around 90 per cent of the premises are able to connect to the network,” Amber said.
“nbn regrets the delay in connecting these premises to the nbn, but unfortunately some premises are harder to connect from an engineering perspective and may be located further from existing nbn network assets.”
So nbn is asking for patience, but does lacking an nbn option affect the appeal of a home for potential buyers?
The Mudgee Guardian spoke to local McGrath Estate Agent, Lucas Sheppard.
"Not having the nbn doesn't decrease the value of a home, however, there has been a recent influx of professionals who are moving to the region from Sydney and one of the first questions they ask is if a property has the nbn,” he said.
The Mudgee Guardian is running a short poll at our website to gauge what internet usage is like in the area. Head to mudgeeguardian.com.au for more information.
