"robsignals" wrote in message
...

I suspect all ISP 'pipes' plug into Brighton so our ping will always
be slower than their's and they take precedence.

It's more likely to be dictated by the likely market for ISP services in the
area(s) served by the local 'exchange' i.e. the point where your 'phone line
connects to the rest of the network, since that is also the interconnection
point for your ISP. I expect the population density and demographics mean
that central Brighton & Hove gets a *lot* more hardware for broadband
services than you would find in most of the rest of Sussex.

Clive Feather has a handy guide to this on his website:

http://www.davros.org/phones/btnetwork.html

--
DAS