Telecom news

• UK taxpayers exposed with creditors set to take over struggling broadband provider

  19-01-2026 08:57
  National Wealth Fund, NatWest and Lloyds make move after unsuccessful attempt to sell Gigaclear
  
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• Brussels in move to bar Chinese suppliers from EU’s critical infrastructure

  17-01-2026 06:00
  Proposed Cybersecurity Act would phase out groups such as Huawei and ZTE from telecom networks and solar energy systems
  
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• Pikes at the Palace: English civil war re-enactors to march through London

  16-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A Sunday morning later this month will take on the colours and clatter of another age, as more than 200 men and women in full English Civil War dress gather in the heart of London.The occasion is the annual march organised by the English Civil War Society to commemorate the death of King Charles I, executed on 30 January 1649. For more than half a century, the Society has marked the anniversary on the last Sunday of January with a solemn procession down The Mall, recalling what contemporaries de
  
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• From Skylons to brick-walls – see the next generation of jewellery designers

  16-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  If you want a glimpse at the future of jewellery, there’s an exhibition of emerging jewellers and silversmiths at the Goldsmiths’ Centre in Farringdon at the moment.The display features designs ranging from Japonisme-inspired nature motifs and marine life frozen in wax and cast in metal to reclaimed glass reimagined with gemstones and stone-setting.
  Jewellery, generally being quite small and wearable, it’s only a small-sized exhibition, filling the Goldsmiths’ Centre&rsqu
  
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• Lifts approved for some London stations – but others lose out as DfT scales back plans

  16-01-2026 11:01 via ianvisits.co.uk
  The government has confirmed it is pushing ahead with plans to add lifts to more London railway stations, but has also cancelled several expected station upgrades.
  Bushey station (c) ianVisits
  There are stations that the Department for Transport (DfT) says are progressing to detailed design. These include Dalston Kingsland, Esher, Gunnersbury, Kew Bridge, and Raynes Park. Gunnersbury was already progressing to design work, so that’s more of a confirmation of what was already known.
  However
  
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• Mayor to push London council tax precept above £500 to fund policing and rail plans

  15-01-2026 21:08 via ianvisits.co.uk
  The Mayor of London is raising the GLA’s take from London’s council tax to fund an increase in policing and support the potential West London Orbital railway link.In total, the Mayor is proposing that council tax increases by an additional £20.13 a year for an average Band D household, subject to final approvals next month. Consequently, the Band D council tax payable in the 32 London boroughs (the adjusted precept) is proposed to increase by 4.1% from £490.38 in 2025-26
  
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• Tickets Alert: 200th anniversary tours of London Zoo

  15-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  To celebrate its bicentenary, London Zoo is launching a programme of monthly history tours that delve into two centuries of animals, architecture and scientific discovery.The guided walks are included as a free extra with a paid Zoo visit and run on a rotating theme throughout the year, allowing visitors to choose tours that match their particular interests in the Zoo’s long and varied past.
  Each tour starts at 11:30am from the main entrance once you are inside the Zoo, and lasts for aroun
  
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• SpaceX partner EchoStar struggles to reach escape velocity

  15-01-2026 16:22
  Charlie Ergen’s future will probably be guided by what happens to Elon Musk’s company
  
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• Imber Bus confirms its 2026 date for a surreal ride through Salisbury Plain

  15-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  An early notice that the annual Imber Bus Day has already confirmed its 2026 date, so you can reserve the date in your calendar now.ImberBus is a standard London bus route that runs just one day a year, weaving its way through the sealed-off military lands of Salisbury Plain, past burnt-out tanks and military bases to an abandoned medieval church in the middle of a military training village before scattering off to various random outposts all around the firing range and local villages.
  It’
  
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• Strawberry Hill’s new exhibition chases a lost dagger with a questionable past

  15-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Two daggers that didn’t belong to King Henry VIII have gone on display, as part of an exhibition about another lost dagger that also didn’t belong to Henry VIII.
  With me so far?We’re in Horace Walpole’s gothic manor house at Strawberry Hill, and he owned a richly decorated dagger that he was told had belonged to the King.
  However, more recent research has indicated that it was likely a decorative dagger made at the imperial workshops in late 16th-century Istanbul and expo
  
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• Archaeologists uncover Victorian children’s schoolwork in east London

  15-01-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Archaeologists working in East London have made a rare discovery that is seldom preserved in the historical record — an unusually intimate glimpse into the lives of Victorian children.
  Brick cellars heavily covered with soot (c) MOLA
  Among the finds uncovered by MOLA at the excavation site in East London was a fragment of a slate school tablet, still bearing the faint scratches of children’s handwriting and doodles, alongside a hoard of ceramic marbles – known as “al
  
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• Half price entry to Dr Johnson’s House on Friday afternoons

  14-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Bargain (noun): Something pleasingly inexpensive – especially when it involves one of London’s great literary landmarks.
  Dr Johnson’s House (c) ianVisits
  If you fancy a cultured detour just off Fleet Street, there’s a definition worth learning first: entry to Dr Johnson’s House is half price every Friday afternoon. It gives you an ideal excuse to step off the pavement and into the birthplace of the modern English dictionary.
  House (noun): A seventeenth-century townh
  
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• Tickets Alert: 2026 tours of privately owned Longford Castle

  14-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  An unusual castle built on the banks of the River Avon 450 years ago, and still a private home, offers occasional tours through the summer, with tickets now available.
  Longford Castle (c) ianVisits
  This is Longford Castle, the private home of the Earl of Radnor, a 16th-century building whose strikingly unconventional exterior hints at what lies inside. Behind the walls is an art collection, rich enough in Old Master paintings to rival many major galleries, set within interiors that reflect centu
  
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• Urban Rewilding: Beavers could return to a south London park

  14-01-2026 14:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  London’s largest Beaver enclosure could be coming to South London soon as part of a rewilding plan for South Norwood Country Park.Croydon Council’s proposal would introduce a family of beavers to the park to help restore wildlife habitats, improve water quality, and create a healthier natural environment.
  The council is working with Citizen Zoo, specialists in urban rewilding, who are assessing the site’s potential. Citizen Zoo also helped deliver London’s first openly ac
  
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• Ticket checks ramped up on the DLR in fare evasion crackdown

  14-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Fare evasion is set to get harder on the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) as the operator steps up ticket inspections on trains.As most of the DLR stations don’t have ticket barriers, there’s a certain level of trust that people tend to do the right thing and pay for transport, and the vast majority do pay to take a ride on the DLR.
  A trial in 2023 tested whether making the ticket machines more noticeable would help reduce incidents of people genuinely forgetting to tap in/out on t
  
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• Man arrested over £260,000 graffiti spree on Northern line trains

  14-01-2026 08:40 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A person suspected of causing nearly £260,000 of graffiti damage to tube trains has been arrested following a British Transport Police (BTP) investigation.
  Bakerloo line train at Lambeth North tube station (c) ianVisits
  Officers from the BTP’s Operational Support Unit forced entry to a property in Barnet, north London, during the early hours of Friday 9th January.
  A 48-year-old man was arrested at the address on suspicion of criminal damage and taken into custody for questioning. He
  
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• Wellington Arch at 200: The monument that lost a statue and gained a tunnel

  14-01-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Today marks the 200th anniversary of Wellington Arch being approved to be built at Hyde Park Corner. Although today it’s in a different location, it has a different statue on top and is technically still unfinished.Originally called the Grand Triumphal Arch, it was built in part to commemorate Britain’s victories in the Napoleonic Wars and as part of King George IV’s remodelling of Hyde Park and Buckingham Palace.
  Announced in 1825, it would take a year of wrangling to settle o
  
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• TfL launches hunt for women who inspired Londoners to start cycling

  13-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Transport for London (TfL) and Santander Cycles have launched a call for nominations to celebrate women who inspire others to get on two wheels.
  “I do not see why Ladies should not have a Lark as well as the Gentlemen.” – 1819 satirical print
  Members of the public are being invited to put forward the name of a professional women’s cycling star or an ‘unsung hero’ from their own community, along with a short explanation of how that person encouraged them to tak
  
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• Friends, foes and six-foot canvases: Turner and Constable face off at Tate Britain

  13-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  There’s a bit of Kane and Abel in the Tate Britain at the moment, as they pitch two friends turned rivals – Constable and Turner – together in a single exhibition.
  Born within a year of each other, but to very different families, the two set out to become artists, but on different paths that eventually led to rivalry in the art galleries of London.
  Critics of the time pitted the two against each other, comparing Constable’s truth to Turner’s poetry. Despite their di
  
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• Distressed debt buyer applies to put UK broadband operator into administration

  13-01-2026 10:35
  FitzWalter Capital’s move at G.Network is set to mark the first insolvency in Britain’s ‘altnet’ sector for years
  
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• Distressed debt buyer applies to put UK broadband firm into administration

  13-01-2026 10:35
  FitzWalter Capital’s move at G.Network is set to mark the first insolvency in Britain’s ‘altnet’ sector in years
  
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• Tickets Alert: Tours of UK construction sites

  13-01-2026 10:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  The annual event, which showcases the construction industry by letting people go behind the hoardings onto building sites, returns in March, and booking is open now.Although aimed at potential future constructors, the curious public is also welcome to visit some of the venues.
  The event, Open Doors 2026, showcases the construction industry and aims to demonstrate the variety of careers in the trade. Open Doors aims to change perceptions around construction and encourage the next generation
  
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• Openreach needs to make full fibre broadband work

  13-01-2026 06:00
  BT’s infrastructure company cannot retreat on its plans for a national digital network
  
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• An Organ on the Run: The Hammersmith school organ with a hidden past

  12-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A pipe organ in a Hammersmith school has recently been identified as having a rare survivor that was smuggled out of France to prevent it from being seized by the French government.
  (c) Sacred Heart High School
  The organ at the Sacred Heart High School on Hammersmith Road was thought to date to around 1883, when the chapel was built. However, recent research has revealed that it was actually made by the Flemish organ builder Hippolyte Loret around 1861-2.
  It was built for Sacred Heart’s Pa
  
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• Eleven miles of costumes: Take a tour of the vast Angels Costumes warehouse

  12-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  There’s an Indiana Jones-esque style warehouse in North London packed full of costumes from film and stage – and they offer occasional tours to have a look around.This is the Hendon headquarters of Angels Costumes, which has been providing clothes to actors since 1840, when Morris Angel started selling second-hand clothes in Covent Garden. At a time when actors were expected to provide their own costumes and were often judged more by their clothes than their acting skills, young Morr
  
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• The Ivy offering £19.17 two-course menu across its London restaurants

  12-01-2026 10:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  If you’ve ever fancied eating at The Ivy restaurant, they’re offering a special meal deal for under £20.
  (c) The Ivy
  The original Ivy opened in 1917, so to honour the year they first welcomed guests, they’re inviting you to try a specially curated menu, priced at just £19.17 at their Collection restaurants.
  For celeb spotters, disappointment as it’s not available at the Original Ivy – so you won’t be getting a dose of bargain celeb spotting, but th
  
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• London’s Alleys: Wesleyan Place, Kentish Town, NW5

  12-01-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  This short L-shaped passage next to the London Overground at Gospel Oak is one of the oldest passages in the area, but was once about twice as long as it is today.Leading off Highgate Road, which was once Green Street, Wesleyan Place was a U-shaped road that ran around the backs of the houses facing onto the main street.
  OS map 1851
  As is so often the case in this part of London, the passage was sliced in half by the arrival of the railways, and then it got worse. Initially, the Tottenham &
  
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• Patrick Drahi revives sale of stake in German broadband network

  12-01-2026 06:00
  Franco-Israeli telecoms tycoon launches latest effort to reduce $50bn debt pile
  
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• Drahi revives sale of stake in German broadband network

  12-01-2026 06:00
  Franco-Israeli telecoms tycoon launches latest effort to reduce $50bn debt pile
  
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• Fans, Frigates and Flirtation: Jane Austen’s world in Greenwich exhibitions

  09-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  We’re in the midst of Jane Austen’s 250th-anniversary celebrations, and Greenwich has put together two exhibitions that illuminate very different sides of life in her time – one social and decorative, the other naval and personal.
  Greenwich Fan Museum
  “It is a truth universally acknowledged…” that a Georgian lady was rarely seen without a fan — and the Fan Museum is filled with them.Part fashion accessory, part cooling device, part coded instrument of f
  
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• TfL signs Otis to keep the Tube’s escalators moving until the 2040s

  09-01-2026 12:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Transport for London (TfL) has awarded a 16-year contract to Otis to service and modernise 172 of its escalators across the London Underground network.
  Farringdon station (c) ianVisits
  The deal significantly expands Otis’s role underground. Once the contract begins, the company will maintain more than 300 of TfL’s roughly 570 escalators, making it the single largest escalator contractor on the network.
  Otis has a long history with the London Underground, as it was the firm that insta
  
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• Billiards without Beer: The time London tried to cure itself of the booze

  09-01-2026 07:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  At their peak, nearly a third of England’s temperance halls aimed at curbing the scourge of alcohol once stood in London — a statistic that says as much about Victorian drinking habits in the capital as it does about the scale of the movement that rose up to challenge them.
  And many of the survivors are “hidden in plain sight” with new names and functions.
  The Old Vic theatre — originally the Royal Victoria Coffee Music Hall (c) Historic England
  That concentration i
  
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• Barking railway footbridge reopens, ending three years of detours for local residents

  08-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A dangerous footbridge in east London that had to be closed after someone fell through the floor onto the railway below has been replaced, three years after it closed.In August 2022, a pedestrian crossing the Kennedy Road footbridge near Barking station had to be taken to hospital with minor injuries after he fell onto the railway.
  The old footbridge was demolished shortly afterwards, but in doing so, it severed the only crossing over the railway in this part of town. For people on the eastern s
  
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• London’s Butchers Hall confirms dates for next Carvery Lunches

  08-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  If you fancy lunch in one of the City of London’s ancient livery halls, it’s possible. Livery Halls are usually only open to members or hired out for events, but the Livery Hall of the Worshipful Company of Butchers, near the Barbican, holds monthly(ish) public lunches.
  (c) Butchers’ Hall
  Guests are welcomed with a drink reception from 12:15pm on the Ground Floor, before ascending to the Great Hall, where lunch is served at 1pm.
  You probably want to bring a coat, if only to hav
  
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• Too hot to Handel: Pipe organs reveal the truth about warming churches

  08-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Church archives are usually thought of as records of baptisms, marriages and burials stretching back centuries. But many churches also hold a second, largely overlooked archive: a record of temperature.
  That is, if the church has a pipe organ.
  St Giles without Cripplegate (c) ianVisits
  Most do, and pipe organs need periodic tuning as the seasons change. When organ tuners carry out that work, many will write down details of the ambient temperature and humidity at the time. Those observations are
  
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• London’s Pocket Parks: Katherine Buchan Meadow, Hanwell, W7

  08-01-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  This is a recently revamped pocket park on a Hanwell side street on a plot of land that was once the site of almshouses.Back when this was still being turned from fields into homes, in 1876 local resident Katherine Buchan paid for four almshouses to be built next to St Mark’s Church in memory of her father. They continued providing accommodation for poor single ladies of the parish until the 1970s, by which time the four homes were in a state of disrepair and were demolished.
  OS map 1960 s
  
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• Tickets Alert: Sandhurst military academy’s tours for 2026

  07-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Not far outside London is Sandhurst, the British Army’s military training centre for officers, and it holds occasional tours of the grand buildings hidden behind high walls.
  The tours are a mix of learning about the military heritage, exploring several grand and impressive buildings, and seeing grounds that are usually off-limits to the public.
  I visited in 2023 – review here.Tours take place at on select dates and must be booked in advance. Once a date is agreed upon, you will arran
  
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• South Bermondsey station reopens after its platform was replaced over Christmas

  07-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  South Bermondsey station reopened earlier this week following a long closure to replace the ageing platform with something a tad less bouncy.The station, managed by Southern, can be politely described as the sort of station with a face fit for radio, with barely a shed of an entrance and a dank staircase up to the platforms. All this is accentuated by the station being a bit of a walk from the main road, along a long path that just happens to be a disused freight railway line.The original statio
  
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• Jubilee line embankment works to begin near Queensbury, lasting until summer 2027

  07-01-2026 14:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  There’s going to be around 18 months of work on the northern end of the Jubilee line, where it runs high up on raised embankments.
  Raised embankment passing over the road outside Queensbury station
  A letter sent to local residents and shared by the local Councillor, Jayanti Patel, informs them that the works will start in a couple of weeks time, on 16th January 2026 and last for around 18 months, completing in summer 2027.
  The affected area is the raised embankment around Queensbury tube s
  
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• Steel and rhyme, Still on time: 40 years of Poems on the Underground

  07-01-2026 11:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  The first Poems on the Underground appeared in tube trains in February 1986, with poems by Robert Burns and Percy Shelley dwelling on city life, and 40 years later, it’s still running, with a new set of poems about to go on display.
  (c) TfL
  The whole idea of using space on the tube adverts to display poems came from New York born, London resident writer and lecturer, Judith Chernaik, who had a “passion for London and a passion for English poetry”.
  She proposed the Poems on the
  
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• Berkeley Square swaps Nightingales for Dinosaurs as a Triceratops arrives

  07-01-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  In Berkeley Square, where once a nightingale sang, a Triceratops has come to rest.This is Paul Vanstone’s life-size Carrara Triceratops Skull sculpture, now on display in Berkeley Square. Carved from a single 10 tonne block of white Carrara marble sourced from Italy, the work is an artistic interpretation of a 68-million-year-old sub-adult Triceratops Skull exhibited by the nearby art dealer, David Aaron at Frieze Masters 2025.
  The Triceratops roamed the plains of what is now North America
  
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• After a decade of delay, Earl’s Court finally gets planning permission for 4,000 homes

  06-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A decade after the Earls Court Exhibition Centre was demolished, planning permission has finally been granted to build homes on the site.
  Proposed development – Source: planning documents
  There have been attempts to do something with the site since 2008, with outline planning granted in 2013, but the plans were dropped following extensive local opposition.
  Originally planned to have some 8,000 homes, including rebuilding council housing around the site, following lengthy protests, the core
  
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• Frameless unveils new annual ticket as a budget-friendly option for repeat visits

  06-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Frameless, the huge basement space next to Marble Arch, filled with animated artworks that you walk into, has introduced an annual ticket offer, which can be a much cheaper option for regular visitors.A visit normally costs around £25-£30, depending on various factors, but the new annual ticket is available for £60 per person. So, if you’re the sort of person who would like to visit at least three times in a year, then the annual ticket is going to be a better option for
  
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• Award-winning theatre set designs go on show at the National Theatre

  06-01-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  If, as is claimed, the world is a stage, then there’s an entire solar system of minute worlds on display at the moment, showing off the craft of creating theatre stage sets.These are the winners of the biennial Linbury Prize for Stage Design, established in 1987 by Lady Anya Sainsbury to champion the next generation of stage designers and model makers. The winners and their designs are currently on display at the National Theatre.
  The exhibition itself is largely made up of presentation bo
  
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• Winter sale on Eurostar train trips to mainland Europe

  06-01-2026 12:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  If you’ve been eyeing up a winter escape by rail, Eurostar has just provided a timely nudge, with a new sale offering tickets from £35 each way on its core European routes.
  (c) ianVisits
  The discounted fares apply to journeys between London and Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Lille, for travel taking place between 19 January and 25 March 2026.
  While there are a handful of blackout dates, around 90% of dates during the sale period seem to be available at the headline price,
  
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• New book reveals the overlooked modern architecture of Britain’s Big Four railways

  06-01-2026 11:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A new book is about to be published that examines the architecture of the Big Four railway companies during the interwar years.
  (c) Daniel Wright and Philip Butler
  From the grouping of the Big Four in 1923 to nationalisation in 1947, there was a short-lived yet sweeping transformation in railway architecture, from ornate Neo-Classical designs to the bold new forms of Streamline Modernism.
  As the authors, Philip Butler and Daniel Wright, note, while Charles Holden’s London Underground stati
  
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• UK broadband operator sold to distressed debt specialist

  06-01-2026 00:01
  G.Network’s lenders trigger sale of company with £300mn of net debt but just 25,000 customers
  
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• Tickets Alert: Tours of the richly decorated Moor Park Mansion

  03-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  A private manor house on the outskirts of London, built in its current style 300 years ago, will have a handful of public open days this year to see its richly decorated interior.The house stands on the site of a former 16th-century palace where Catherine of Aragon lived after the annulment of her marriage to Henry VIII. While the current building dates from around 1617, it was extensively remodelled in the 1720s into the grand manor seen today.
  And “grand” barely does it justice.Own
  
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• Lewisham asks public for ideas to rescue and reopen the Ladywell Playtower

  02-01-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  Lewisham Council is seeking suggestions on how to restore the decaying Ladywell Playtower in south London and reopen it to the public.
  The Ladywell Playtower
  As one of Lewisham’s most significant Grade II listed sites, the Ladywell Playtower opened in 1884 as a swimming pool and public hall, and despite closing in 2004, the Grade II listed building remains a feature of the neighbourhood.
  The building was damaged by fire in 2006, but in 2022, the council agreed a development plan that would
  
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• ‘Jewel in the Strand’ project backed by £4.6m grant for St Mary Le Strand church

  02-01-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  The central London church of St Mary Le Strand has received a £4.6 million grant toward the cost of urgent repair and conservation works.
  (c) ianVisits
  As part of the grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, both the 18th-century building and its gardens will be restored and redeveloped, alongside work to transform the Undercroft into a community space and improve accessibility throughout.
  A research project will also uncover three centuries of stories about the people who worshipped
  
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