(As first published on the RiotACT)

Many of you in the North of Canberra are acutely aware of the ongoing Internet performance issues being experienced by residents the of Gungahlin, parts of Kaleen and even Watson.

If you have ever wondered why the Internet at your place never seem to work as well as your friend in Hackett, or Monash? This site may be able to help explain why.

It had always annoyed me that the Internet became almost unusable around 8:00pm each night and why no one seemed to want to fix it. I raised tickets with my ISP and received the same response each time.

Our Wholesale Provider has reported a congestion fault with your service, there is no ETA on its resolution at this time.

After months and months of heartache my apathy finally gave way to action. Much to my wife’s dismay I started a campaign to try and resolve the issue.

I have spent the greater part of the last month compiling data and researching the issue of poor Internet performance in Gungahlin. All of what I have found out I have published on a website www.actbroadband.net

Self promotion aside, I have managed to document the problem as well as my attempts to address the issue. I have set up monitoring of Internode infrastructure and generated a number of months worth of performance reports. I have also published all the correspondence I have had with my ISP and will have with Territory Legislative Assembly Members and Federal Members of Parliament.

I have prepared letters to all Legislative Assembly Representatives for Molonglo - posted on my site, as all the responses as I receive them.

If you at the level of frustrations as I am with the whole Internet thing, please contact me through the site. I am happy to hear from fellow Gungahlin residents who are having the same experience as I am. Numerous people have already contacted me with their support after visiting the site.

It is my intention to keep this an issue until it is resolved. There are 38,000 residents in the Gungahlin area, the majority of which are suffering as I am. Any support in this endeavour will be greatly appreciated.

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Alan Kerlin: ABC Radio 666's Genevieve Jacobs picked up this issue and interviewed Russell, myself, David Forman from the Competitive Carrier’s Coalition, and Chris Taylor, Managing Director for Telstra Country Wide ACT. You can listen to the interviews here, with thanks to the ABC for covering this important issue for us.

ABC 666 Radio Gungahlin Broadband interviews 30 September 2009

Following my interview the guy from Telstra said he is living in Gungahlin but being perfectly happy with his NextG wireless service. So I was immediately kicking myself for not raising how absurd it is for Telstra to be saying that people who can’t even get basic ADSL1 should just go wireless. Expensive + slow + low caps = unacceptable. In fact I think one could mount a decent case that Telstra has fostered the situation to force people onto it wireless service to get it up to critical mass quicker. In the same way they pushed more and more people away from landlines to mobiles.

After many years of pursuing the issue when in opposition to her credit, the ball will be very much in Senator Kate Lundy’s court to make sure that the NBN rollout does not neglect Gungahlin’s broadband issues and get us a lasting fix to the underlying infrastructure and anticompetitive problems.

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