On March 1, 2018, the symbolic ground-breaking ceremony for the broadband expansion in the district of Steinfurt am Teutoburger Wald took place in Lengerich, North Rhine-Westphalia. In addition to Lengerich, the towns of Ladbergen and Tecklenburg as well as the municipality of Lienen will benefit from the connection to high-speed internet.
Wilhelm Möhrke (Mayor of Lengerich), Udo Decker-König (Mayor of Ladbergen), Stefan Streit (Mayor of Tecklenburg), Arne Strietelmeier (Mayor of Lienen), Martin Schnitzler (teutel Managing Director), Daniel Wolter (Head of Technology and Shared Service, Stadtwerke Lengerich GmbH), Dirk Riekenberg (Managing Director of Teutoburger Planungs- und Dienstleistungsgesellschaft) as well as the project coordinators of the Steinfurt district and representatives of the telecommunications companies carrying out the work performed the symbolic ground-breaking ceremony and are now looking positively into the digital future together with the citizens of the district from the Tecklenburger Land region.
Matthias Schulze-Mantei (aconium GmbH, project sponsor for the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure(BMVI)) emphasized the importance of the ground-breaking ceremony and the resulting improvement in location factors for the region. The federal government is subsidizing the infrastructure projects of the towns of Ladbergen, Lengerich and Tecklenburg as well as the municipality of Lienen with a total of 20.4 million euros as part of the BMVI’s federal broadband funding programme. Teutoburger Planungs- und Dienstleistungsgesellschaft successfully submitted two applications for Lengerich, Ladbergen, Tecklenburg and Lienen to cover an economic viability gap. Lienen and Ladbergen will receive 9 million euros in funding from the federal government and 8.3 million euros from the state. Lengerich and Tecklenburg will receive almost 11.3 million euros from the federal government and 9.8 million euros from North Rhine-Westphalia.
The mayor of Lengerich, Wilhelm Möhrke, explained that with several successful applications for funding from the federal and state governments and in close cooperation with the individual municipalities, citizens living in rural areas are now also being provided with fast Internet connections. As part of the civil engineering measures for the broadband expansion of Teutoburger Planungs- und Dienstleistungsgesellschaft, over 900 kilometers of empty conduits are being laid and 190 new cable branches are being installed. Udo Decker-König particularly emphasized the safe laying depth of the empty conduits of 80 centimetres, in which the telecommunications lines will be laid.
Once the infrastructure project is completed at the end of 2019, more than 4,000 households and two schools will benefit from internet access with transmission rates of at least 50 Mbit/s. In addition, 257 companies will receive internet access with transmission rates of at least 1 Gbit/s. According to Udo Decker-König, the use of fiber optics in particular will provide citizens with optimal connectivity. Fast Internet connections are in high demand among companies in the Tecklenburger Land region and are an important location factor, especially in rural areas.
Photo, from left to right: Martin Schnitzler (Managing Director of teutel), Dirk Riekenberg (Managing Director of Teutoburger Planungs- und Dienstleistungsgesellschaft), Matthias Schulze-Mantei (aconium GmbH), Wilhelm Möhrke (Mayor of Lengerich), Stefan Streit (Mayor of Tecklenburg), Arne Strietelmeier (Mayor of Lienen) and Udo Decker-König (Mayor of Ladbergen) at the symbolic ground-breaking ceremony on 01.03.2018 in Lengerich.
Photo credit: Jennifer Diehl (teutel GmbH)