Mobile Operators To Improve Coverage In National Parks

Mobile coverage in England’s National Parks is set to be improved thanks to a new agreement between the Mobile Operators Association (MOA), which represents EE, O2, Three and Vodafone, and National Parks England, an umbrella association of National Park Authorities (NPAs).

Around ten percent of the country is located within a national park and the NPAs hope the new agreement will sustain thriving communities within their territories while protecting the wildlife and cultural heritage of each park.

National Parks England claims that nine in ten of all SMBs need a mobile phone to conduct business and argues that national parks should be prioritised for rural mobile coverage because of the 90 million tourists that visit each year.

Rural mobile partnership

The new agreement will seek to solve many of the challenges associated with covering rural areas, the availability of electricity and backhaul for potential sites, as well as the cost of building and maintaining infrastructure in areas where the revenue generated is likely to be minimal.

NPAs will work with operators to identify sites that provide ideal coverage and minimise environmental impact, with measures such as site sharing and mast sharing encouraged to lessen the effects. All parties will meet at least once a year to monitor progress made in the project.

“National Parks have always been about finding pragmatic long term solutions to the many competing demands on land,” says Jim Bailey, chair of National Parks England and the North York Moors National Park Authority. “Ensuring modern telecommunications infrastructure is no different. Today’s agreement will be good for the thousands of businesses and people living in our National Parks, for the millions who visit them, and for the stunning landscapes and towns that are the lifeblood for our rural economies.”

Welcome boost

“There are compelling social and economic reasons for having good mobile connectivity, including mobile broadband, in rural areas; the benefits are even greater to rural communities, because such connectivity mitigates the disadvantages of greater physical distances and poor transport links,” adds John Cooke, executive director of MOA.

The government has welcomed the move, claiming that national parks are “living, working places” worth more than £4 billion to the national economy.

“They need access to the modern communications that many of us have taken for granted for years,” says communications minister Ed Vaizey.

The government has already pledged £530 million to help fund the rollout of fibre broadband in areas where it is not commercially viable to do so as part of the Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) project. It has also committed £150 million to improving mobile signal in rural locations with the Mobile Infrastructure Project (MIP), the contract for which was awarded to Arqiva last year.

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