The symbolic ground-breaking ceremony for a further expansion area in Lower Saxony took place on June 18, 2018. The Georgsmarienhütte Hasbergen region is part of the Osnabrück district’s digitalization concept, which focuses primarily on the outskirts of towns and municipalities in order to close the ‘white spots’ there.
“With its digital offensive, the district of Osnabrück is sending out a signal that the region is also well positioned for the future as a business location. At the same time, it is our goal that the citizens also benefit. This is also demonstrated by our commitment in Brannenheide,” explained District Administrator Michael Lübersmann, who attended the ground-breaking ceremony in Brannenheide, a district of Georgsmarienhütte, together with Mayor Ansgar Pohlmann (Georgsmarienhütte), Mayor Holger Elixmann (Hasbergen), Thorsten Schoppmeyer (broadband coordinator for the district of Osnabrück) and representatives of the companies involved in the expansion.
The infrastructure project north of the Teutoburg Forest is being funded with 15 million euros from the Federal Broadband Funding Program of the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) as part of the first of two funding applications. The state of Lower Saxony is contributing 5 million euros. The district and the 34 towns and municipalities belonging to the district are contributing almost 13.7 million euros. Upon completion, over 6,000 households will be provided with bandwidths of at least 50 Mbit/s. In addition, 4 schools and 7 kindergartens will be connected to the NGA network. Previously underserved rural business addresses will also benefit from the expansion. A total of 689 companies are to be given access to gigabit connections – data transfer rates of at least 1 Gbit/s.
The district is planning to use the network infrastructure to expand intelligent mobility solutions. This will benefit the control of charging stations for e-mobility, real-time information systems for public transport and the intelligent control of private transport. The data required for this is read out via sensors and can be transferred to video and signal systems with the help of the NGA network. This enables effective traffic management – a key to the future viability of regions. The mayors of the towns involved expressly welcome the investments. “Future-proof digital infrastructure is essential for our companies in every sector, but also in private households. This expansion is an important building block on which we can and must continue to build,” explained Ansgar Pohlmann and Holger Elixmann added: “With this expansion, we are showing the business community that we are listening to their concerns.”
Photo: Symbolic photo for broadband expansion.
Photo credit: aconium GmbH / Florian Schuh