On-train wifi at risk

[Darius43]

Most on train WiFi that I have experienced has been woefully inadequate so its removal would have minimal impact to me.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

[jjb1970]

I always found it fine for stuff other than video streaming. More airlines are opening up in-flight wi-fi without charging (some offer an hour free, or unlimited in business class and high tier frequent flyers) and they all seem to block video sites to conserve bandwidth. 

[kevinlms]

On 23/05/2023 at 06:22, rogerzilla said:

You can't even make a 2G voice call on the GWML unless you're sitting in one of the main stations.  Good luck getting a 4G/5G data connection.

You're kidding me!

2G was turned off years ago in Australia and 3G has been turned off by one of the 3 mobile services, with the other 2 due for later this year (2024).

 

But perhaps a typo for 3G?

[spamcan61]

3 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

You're kidding me!

2G was turned off years ago in Australia and 3G has been turned off by one of the 3 mobile services, with the other 2 due for later this year (2024).

 

But perhaps a typo for 3G?

2G will likely outlast 3G in the UK, 2G is used for many machine to machine comms, 'smart' meters and suchlike. 3G was always a bit of a halfway house with more cost & complexity than 2G but less bandwidth efficiency than 4G.

[AMJ]

If the trains end up being a bit like the buses that are supposed to have Wifi the operators seem to be keeping the access points turned on but the link to the mobile network seems to fail or has been turned off for sake of saving money.  Even the newest (5 year old) vehicles seem to have issues with the wifi.

 

I envisage that many operators will see it as a means to cut a few pounds from the cost of running the service per vehicle that they can then get back into the bottom line.

 

We joking say that at some time passengers (not customers) will be wanting/expecting that preserved railways also provide onboard wifi in the trains.  I'd be tempted to setting up a small Arduino type of device that upon folks connecting to the wifi they get a page to say "Enjoy your train ride, this is a heritage train built before wifi, look out of the window and relax!"

[Reorte]

28 minutes ago, AMJ said:

We joking say that at some time passengers (not customers) will be wanting/expecting that preserved railways also provide onboard wifi in the trains.  I'd be tempted to setting up a small Arduino type of device that upon folks connecting to the wifi they get a page to say "Enjoy your train ride, this is a heritage train built before wifi, look out of the window and relax!"

You laugh - after all, what's the point of going if you're not going to pay attention to the journey? - but I did once fall asleep on the East Lancs.

[Colin_McLeod]

On 22/05/2023 at 17:25, Fishoutofwater said:

A quote from Mr Wolmar :

"People expect to be able to use wi-fi on a train in the same way they would use a toilet," he told the BBC.

 

Really?

The mind boggles!

 

Would that mean that you can't use wi-fi when the train is standing at the station? 😀

[rab]

On 22/05/2023 at 17:06, phil-b259 said:

How typical - when will the thick people at the DfT realise that you are not going to attract passengers back to the trains if you are constantly making the experience worse!

 

With rail fares so high that if there is more than one person making the trip using a car is much cheaper in cost terms, Rail has to compete largely on service and amenities - both of which a steady being ripped up by idiots in Whitehall and their political masters who are inching to find ways of cutting taxes before or after the next election and to hell with the consequences.

 

Meanwhile the DfT continues to waste millions with stupid but expensive deckchair re- arranging like GBR!

I can't help feeling a slight sense of deja vu here.

 

About sixty years ago I remember people saying that

British Railways seemed to be deliberately driving people

away by removing apparently well used services.

 

Then they called in some guy called Beeching,

who recommended closing lines because

they weren't being used.

 

 

[kevinlms]

On 03/01/2024 at 02:44, spamcan61 said:

2G will likely outlast 3G in the UK, 2G is used for many machine to machine comms, 'smart' meters and suchlike. 3G was always a bit of a halfway house with more cost & complexity than 2G but less bandwidth efficiency than 4G.

Nevertheless, in Australia 2G went long ago and 3G is going to be gone for good later this year.

Mobile carriers here pay a lot for their licencing of spectrum and want the best usage.

https://www.finder.com.au/australian-2g-switch-off

 

Stuff like 'smart' meters is on 4G and items like the Myki transport ticketing system, had to shift from 3G to 4G, as did alarm systems and medical alarms.

[Boris]

On 02/01/2024 at 17:05, Reorte said:

You laugh - after all, what's the point of going if you're not going to pay attention to the journey? - but I did once fall asleep on the East Lancs.

Ahh yes, the urban legend of people going to the Booking Office at the end of the day and asking for a refund on their train journey because they slept all the way there and back.  Except its not an urban legend because I've seen it happen multiple times!

 

In a similar vein I was told a story by a York driver recently that a passenger was asleep on a train from Harrogate and couldn't be roused at York so went through the wash plant and refuelling before being returned to the platform at York and eventually being woken up 3 or so hours later....

[Forward!]

90% of my train travel is for work. I suspect I'm fairly average modern 'office worker' in that I simply cannot do my job offline- my main means of making voice calls and messaging colleagues/editing documents is Microsoft Teams, and the various professional systems I use are all web-based. Absence of wifi is not really a problem for me as I tether my laptop to my work phone, and if you don't have one, most business laptops have a SIM card slot. As for personal travellers, you can get high-data, SIM-only deals for peanuts now. I expect you'll find that free public wifi will slowly start disappearing from all businesses and public spaces over the coming years, not just the railways.

 

One the trains, knowing there is a basic, slow, but more-or-less reliable wifi connection that I can use as a back up in emergencies is a "good to have", but frankly, I wouldn't think of it as essential.

Edited January 4 by Forward!

[Reorte]

I've always found airline seats on trains unusable for a laptop anyway.

 

In any case in this ever more rushing world I think a train journey should be a good excuse to get a break and just sit back a bit.

[adb968008]

Back in 2001 I went on the Brussels metro… I had a full four bar signal, and perfect connection. (3G as it was then, its 5G now).

Ive recently passed through tunnels in southern Poland on the new remote motorway to Zakopane by car… full 5G signal.

i’m in Zone 5 london suburbs and struggle for a signal… Manchester city centre the signal is very poor.

 

UK Railway wifi… is so slow, I was wondering if it was using Morse code and a telegraph to send the message.

Losing it loses nothing as it was never there to begin with.

 

Even in Ukraine they have starlink on some services… I just had it on my cruise ship last year.. excellant signal.

 

The only barrier is a British one… Tube wifi is a non existent joke too.

 

[kevinlms]

5 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

Back in 2001 I went on the Brussels metro… I had a full four bar signal, and perfect connection. (3G as it was then, its 5G now).

Ive recently passed through tunnels in southern Poland on the new remote motorway to Zakopane by car… full 5G signal.

i’m in Zone 5 london suburbs and struggle for a signal… Manchester city centre the signal is very poor.

 

UK Railway wifi… is so slow, I was wondering if it was using Morse code and a telegraph to send the message.

Losing it loses nothing as it was never there to begin with.

 

Even in Ukraine they have starlink on some services… I just had it on my cruise ship last year.. excellant signal.

 

The only barrier is a British one… Tube wifi is a non existent joke too.

 

If the wifi relies on earlier generations of mobile signal, this is the issue. It's cheap for the operators, because it's already paid for!

[ess1uk]

3 hours ago, adb968008 said:

 

 

The only barrier is a British one… Tube wifi is a non existent joke too.

 

getting anything else to work in the London Tube is a miracle in itself with all the constraints of working in such a confined space.