Reimagining Rural Connectivity: Why the Borderlands region needs a new approach

The Borderlands Partnership 5GIR Programme is challenging preconceptions about what’s possible with rural connectivity, building a locally focussed, long-term, sustainable model for scalable 5G tech that others can replicate, initially focussed on tourism. The network is designed to complement, not replace the mainstream mobile networks. Read more about the Programme in their first blog.

Across the Borderlands, mobile networks struggle to meet demand during peak periods, leaving services and users without the connectivity they need.

At Windermere Ferry, for example, mobile payments often fail due to insufficient mobile signal or network capacity. In Kielder, at The Sill, and in the Tweed Valley, places where people visit, live and work year-round remain beyond the reach of any reliable service. At Stranraer, the absence of connectivity across the loch limits efforts to manage marine operations, monitor the environment, and support tourism. These aren’t minor inconveniences. They are structural barriers to growth, resilience and inclusion.

The Borderlands 5G Innovation Region programme was established to address this gap, not with isolated pilots or temporary fixes, but with a long-term approach to advanced wireless infrastructure and service innovation.

The Windermere Ferry

From Coverage to Capability

Traditional network planning has treated connectivity as a binary question: is there signal, or not? But in practice, the real question is whether the network can support the people, services and systems that depend on it.

This is particularly acute in rural areas, where seasonal peaks, low population density and dispersed demand make traditional investment models difficult to justify. The result is that some of the UK’s most dynamic rural economies are operating with outdated infrastructure, holding back public service innovation, private sector productivity and community wellbeing.

Borderlands is reframing the challenge. We are investing in connectivity as a capability that allows local authorities to deliver services more efficiently, enables businesses to operate more reliably, and helps communities access the tools and information they need. Whether it’s enabling faster incident response and better resource planning for public services, helping local businesses manage bookings and take payments reliably, or giving visitors the confidence to explore more of the region with real-time information at their fingertips, the benefits are practical and wide-ranging.

A Distinctive Approach for a Complex Region

The Borderlands 5GIR model is designed to meet the specific challenges of a vast, diverse and frequently under-served geography. Rather than pursuing a single flagship use case, we are supporting a broad range of public and private applications across multiple venues, such as car park management and flood monitoring to event support and visitor information services.

This shared approach allows us to spread costs across a wide base of users, increasing the operational sustainability of the network while ensuring that investment aligns with real local priorities. The network, contract model and stakeholder partnerships are now in place, with infrastructure designed to scale as new partners and users come on board.

Enabling Future Investment

One of the programme’s long-term objectives is to support market engagement by reducing the cost and complexity of rural deployment. By demonstrating practical demand, aggregating use cases and de-risking the initial infrastructure build, we are helping to create conditions where future investment by mobile network operators, neutral hosts and other commercial providers becomes more viable.

This is not a replacement for commercial delivery. It is an enabling strategy, grounded in collaboration between public and private actors and focused on delivering value through shared outcomes.

Working Together

If you are based in the Borderlands and face a challenge where better connectivity could make a difference, we would welcome a conversation.

The Borderlands 5GIR programme exists to support innovation, build capability, and help our region unlock the full value of advanced wireless connectivity. Get in touch to explore how we might work together by emailing info@borderlandsgrowth.com

Jonathan Harris, Programme Director, Connecting Cumbria