More suburbs join switch

With claims Baldivis faces a connectivity “crisis”, NBN has moved to update the Rockingham and Kwinana communities on the latest news on the technology in other surrounding suburbs.

More than 23,000 homes and businesses in parts of Safety Bay, Rockingham, East Rockingham, Hillman, Cooloongup, Waikiki, Shoalwater and Peron can now access services over the NBN network after the final area was switched on earlier this year.

An additional 12,600 premises within parts of Wellard, Leda, Parmelia, Bertram, Medina, Naval Base, Orelia, Wattleup, Hope Valley, Kwinana Town Centre, Calista, Casuarina, The Spectacles and Anketell can also connect to the NBN.

However, some properties may require additional work for homeowners or businesses to take advantage of the technology.

“We construct the network area by area and we prefer to declare the majority of premises in each area ‘serviceable’ and able to connect rather than holding the entire area back because a small number of premises may need additional work,” WA Corporate Affairs Manager Ebony Aitken said. “Some premises can take a bit longer to connect due to a number of reasons including complex connections, new lead-ins required to be built or ensuring we can achieve the minimum wholesale speeds of 25Mbps. We aim to connect these premises as soon as possible with the average time to connect these premises being a little over six months.”

In the City of Rockingham’s southern suburbs and the City of Mandurah’s northern suburbs, work is due to start next year.

“Construction of the NBN network in parts of Secret Harbour, Karnup, Lakelands, Port Kennedy and Warnbro, covering around 15,500 premises, is expected to commence mid-next year, which the first areas starting to switch on towards to end of 2018 and beginning of 2019,” Ms Aitken said.

Residents can visit the NBN website and use the address checker to see the latest connectivity status of their properties at www.nbnco.com.au.