Innerleithen & District have been successfully upgraded to high-speed broadband and various dignitaries were on hand for the official launch photo call to mark the occasion on Monday, 19th March.

Caption:

Bt Infinity Superfast Broadband is officially launched at Innerleithen, Peeblesshire in the Scottish Borders on 19th March 2012.(L-R) Roddy McKenzie , George Brown (Chair Innerleithen Community Council), Louise Humphrey (Head of Scottish Affairs, BT Group), David Mundell MSP, James McClafferty (BT Regional Director), Councillor Graham Garvie, Marc McColgan (1st customer), Councillor Gavin Logan, Ross McGuinn, Christine Graham MSP, Stuart Bell.

Photo: Graham Riddell Photography

Issued at - 08 Feb 2012, 12:17

Valid from - 09 Feb 2012, 00:00

Valid to - 09 Feb 2012, 18:00

An area of rain will move southeastwards from Scotland into England early on Thursday. In places this will fall onto very cold surfaces, such as roads, and will freeze instantly, forming a layer of ice. The public should be aware that this will make pavements very dangerous locally, and driving conditions could become extremely hazardous, particularly where roads are untreated. There is however a lot of uncertainty regarding how severe this event will be. The warning level may be upgraded to amber in some locations in due course.

By dawn on Thursday slightly less cold air should have reached most of Scotland, allowing any ice to melt here. After dawn this less cold air will slowly move further south, into some parts of northern England, alleviating any icy conditions here too.

We are putting together a FREE directory of local businesses and service providers. It will be distributed to every household and through the Peeblesshire News. All we need are a few pertinent details for the business sent to us for inclusion.

The attached flyer lists the information we need. Please supply this by end of February 2012 to be included and please pass on to anyone else to whom you think this would be relevant.

Kind Regards

Gen

Family ceilidh dance in the Memorial Hall on Sat 18th February.

Tickets from Denis Robson on 01896 830023

See What's On for more info

BT Infinity Superfast Broadband Update at January 2012

Folks,

You may have noticed contractors working by the roadside. They are installing fibre to beside the cabinet and laying the concrete plinth for the fibre cabinet. They have confidence in meeting an end of March 2012 deadline (subject to not being disrupted by bad weather). The BT Openreach engineers should have leaflets on Superfast to hand out.

Now is the time to register your interest in Superfast Broadband and this doesn't commit you to Superfast or even BT but BT will contact you in due course over the available services under Superfast Broadband and the actual date when you can place an order. I am also negotiating with BT for their Infinity demonstration bus to come to the area so you can see more about the service and talk to the staff about Superfast, its facilities and costs - I'll update you shortly on the dates for this.

BT tend to install their fibre street cabinet initially with about 30% of the total capacity and increase this as actual orders come in. As I expect over 50% of Innerleithen to switch to Superfast I would advise everyone to register their interest NOW so that BT can plan their cabinet capacity. Otherwise those who register their interest/order later may have to wait for Superfast until after installation when the cabinet is upgraded with additional equipment. As always you should check prices and availability with your existing ISP and/or other ISPs for cost comparison - do be careful that the ISP is talking about Superfast Broadband. An ISP has to install additional equipment in the BT exchange for Superfast and an unscrupulous salesman may try to pass you off with standard Broadband.

You can register at www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumerProducts/displayTopic.do?topicId=25795

It'll show you the speed you can expect and the go live date - we suspect that BT Infinity are being cautious with the date of 30th June 2012 to allow for any implementation slippage and hopefully this date will come forward. Do remember there is a drop off in speed from the street cabinet due to the physical length of the cable wire running from the cabinet into your house so for example those of us fortunate enough to be closest to the cabinet may get close to 30Mbps download and 10Mbps upload whereas those farther away from the cabinet may receive about 15Mbps download and over 2Mbps upload. These speeds are of course orders of magnitude faster than at present. In my case, 33 times faster on download and 50 times faster on upload - I think I'm happy with that.

You can check your current speed with Think Broadband Speedtest - www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest.html?utm_source=mainsite&utm_medium=navigation&utm_campaign=speedtest&utm_content=sidebar

Monthly costs are shown on another page - www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumerProducts/displayTopic.do?topicId=25633&s_cid=con_ppc_maxus_vidZ59_Broadband&vendorid=Z473&sissr=1

If you have any questions/comments please get back to me. Please distribute to as many people as possible.

Regards
Brian McCrow
1 Cardrona Way
Cardrona
EH45 9LD
01896 833188
07712 841768

Headlines
Snow affecting many areas of Scotland above 200m throughout today and into tomorrow accompanied by severe gale force winds The Central Belt not likely to see significant impacts till around 1800 and continuing overnight into the rush hour on Wednesday although with the possibility that by then that snow level will have risen to around 300m. Snow will at times be wet and combined with the severe gale force winds may result in ice build-up on power lines.

Today Tuesday 13th

A very windy day with frequent showers of rain and sleet at low levels and snow at higher levels. Some frequent and heavy snow showers will affect the western Highlands throughout the day with blizzard conditions at times. Later this afternoon and into the evening a band of more persistent rain sleet and snow will move in from the west accompanied by severe gale force winds gusting widely to 60mph but in excess of 70mph in exposed locations.
Snow is likely to fall widely above around 200m with the potential for accumulations of 10 cm above this level with Blizzard conditions at times. Below 200m it will generally be rain or wet snow but with the potential for accumulations of 2 to 5cm.
This band of more persistent precipitation affecting the western Highlands from late morning will move south and by 1500 will be lying through north Argyll and through the north of Stirlingshire and Perthshire. By 1800 it will be affecting the northern parts of the Central Belt from Glasgow through North Lanarkshire and into Falkirk.
The area of rain and snow will then sink slowly south so that by 2100 it is covering most of southern Scotland. A further band of rain and snow will move into the Central belt around 0300 on Wednesday with snow above 300m although there are some indications that snow could continue down to 200m overnight, this will last through the rush hour on Wednesday with the potential of some further disruption over higher routes in the Central Belt.

(Note in situations like this it is very difficult to be precise as to the levels that snow will fall to and small variations in the forecast can result in a significant change to the impact, snow falls 100m lower and much greater impact snow only falls to 100m higher than forecast and there is limited impact)

Wednesday 14th
More general rain and snow clearing during the morning leaving bright or clear spells and showers, these falling as snow above 300m, mainly across the west and southwest. Brighter and drier conditions will be found to the east of high ground. The showers will become confined to the north and northwest overnight with a widespread frost developing.

Thursday 15th and Friday 16th
The latest forecast runs have the deep depression crossing the south of the UK with the strongest winds being over southern England however this will result in some further snow affecting Scotland however initially this is probably limited to areas above 200-400M in Northern Scotland before extending more widely later on Friday and into Saturday when we get into the northerly airflow behind the low pressure system. There is still a significant degree of uncertainty over the forecast from Thursday onwards.

Yellow warnings and Alerts are in place for parts of Scotland from today right through to and including Friday these will be reviewed later this morning with consideration being given to updating the warning for today to Amber for some areas of Scotland. The latest warnings can be found on our web site at: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/uk/uk_forecast_warnings.html

Important information for Community Councils

I write to advise you that the Met Office has issued a red warning for wind of up to 90mph expected Thursday eth Dec. These winds are expected to peak between 3pm and 6pm. Red warnings for wind are very rare - with only one or two red warnings a year ever issued and they are more common for snow and ice warnings.

A yellow flood alert warning has also been issued for the Borders with heavy rain and snow melt also expected tomorrow morning. While winds will be less strong by Friday, it will still be very blustery on Friday with the risk of snow showers. You can keep up to date with the weather forecast via www.metoffice.gov.uk

We are closely monitoring the situation and a meeting has been held this afternoon to assess what actions should be taken. We will continue to closely monitor the situation and issue further information in due course.

Festive Lighting

In the interest of public safety, it is essential that all festive lighting is switched off until further notice. An email will be issued as soon as it is safe to turn the lighting back on. If you are not the community group responsible for festive lighting - please pass this message on to the relevant group.

Schools

All parents were issued with a text message this afternoon to warn them that schools may have to close either earlier or later in the interest of pupil safety. A further text message is being issued to parents tonight to inform them that all schools will close at lunchtime tomorrow. The decision was made following the information from police, our transport providers and the Met Office.

Parents are being urged to keep listening to local radio, check the council website www.scotborders.gov.uk and follow the council on Twitter @scotborders to keep up to date.

Roads and travel

Major travel disruption is expected across the area tomorrow. We are urging people to pay attention to police travel warnings and be aware that driving during conditions are likely to be extremely poor.

Before travelling, you should check the Traffic Scotland http://trafficscotland.org/ website for up to date information. Whilst travelling drivers should note the information on the variable message signs and listen to radio reports for updates.

Buildings

Winds of this strength have the potential to cause severe damage to properties and trees. Please secure any lose items around your homes to avoid any damage. You should, where possible, avoid being outside in the vicinity of mature trees and also any buildings that look as if they could be vulnerable to damage from high winds.

We will keep you informed of any further developments.

Regards
Tracey Logan
Chief Executive
Scottish Borders Council