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WiFi tube station hell or heaven by June 2012
IT WILL BE HELL or heaven depending upon your view of mobiles on the London Underground and you'll either thank or curse Mayor Boris Johnson for it come June 2012.
The underground's management company, Transport for London (TFL), has decided its trial of WiFi at the Charing Cross Station was a success. With Johnson's backing and London taxpayers dosh the wireless technology will be rolled out across 120 of London's stations by June 2012.
The Charing Cross trial, which started in November last year, involved BT Openzone. It found that over half of the passengers surveyed thought WiFi access would "make their experience of using the Tube better".
Considering the huge number of tourists that are in London at any one time, The INQUIRER can only assume that many of these people surveyed do not actually live in London. And so they won't have to pay for it because it is going to be paid for out of local taxes.
For those who welcome access to the Internet and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephony while standing on the platform, TFL explains that, "A contract will be awarded to the chosen bidder by the end of 2011... passengers will be able to log on to the internet from their laptops or mobile devices at stations before the 2012 Olympic [games]."
What sort of data rate users can expect to get when the trains are halted to "regulate the service" is anyone's guess as everyone tries to text or call the people they are going to be late meeting.
With the Underground as punctual as it is, access to websites to read something when you have finished the Evening Standard newspaper while waiting for a tube train will probably be welcome, but The INQUIRER wonders how much joy that VoIP will bring?
VoIP access on the Tube platforms could condemn London's commuters to a constant barrage of inane, shouted comments such as, "I'M ON THE TUBE" or "I'M STUCK AT THE PLATFORM, YES, SIGNALLING PROBLEM, NO NOT PASSENGER ACTION."
Under Johnson's plan 16 stations will get the service in the first phase. This will no doubt bring to the fore a range of technical challenges from not enough bandwidth to possible unforeseen interference.
Perhaps when the reality of WiFi and VoIP calling on the London underground comes home to roost there will be a sharp public backlash that stops it in its tracks, pun intended.
Of course the TFL statement gives the real reason for this WiFi network, as it burbles, "WiFi services are a potential future revenue source."
But instead of simply stating the truth, Johnson continues to show how divorced he is from reality and says, "[During the Olympics] even Londoners going underground will be able to keep up to date with the British medal tally at the 2012 Games." µ
Tags: Hardware
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I'm paying £16 a month at home. I suspect they still spend more than that, per station, removing accumulated passenger hair from the tunnels and tracks. No, I didn't just get that from Uncyclopedia.
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10326055&wwwflag=2&imagepos=8&screenwidth=767
This article doesn't sound serious but I do hate people talking aloud on phones in a train or tube. Have anyone boarded a train in Japan where the social etiquette bans telephone conversation and loud ring tones in trains? I always find that both amusing and a blessing at the same time.
Or best tech troll evar
Thats right Mr.Reporter. I called you a ludite. Your obvious lack of knowledge about WiFi and your hatred of all things London Underground have shown you to be unable to do the job of a journalist.
Finaly I think the Inq has lost all credibility with your personal rant.
Please go and work for the Daily Mail.
You really seem sadly cynical, jaded and old fashioned for a tech writer.
Should we not be celebrating any jump in technology?
How people choose to use that tech is not for you to judge. If you have a problem with chatter on the tubes then why not use headphones or earplugs than damn a technology before its even got off the ground?
You do realise that all technology starts off crappy, patchy, expensive and unreliable but serves as a foundation for what's to come?
Darling, get off your high horse or start writing for some bitchy celeb magazine instead.
Haha, good luck with the Olympics. Time for London to give some money back to big business, eh..
What a laugh!
I'd go one step further. Ban mobile phones and data services from all public transport where it already works, destroy all technology that has any adverse effect on public, like internal combustion engines, and also burn all literature that helped the development of such technology. In fact, let's burn all books while we are at it.
Yes, I am being sarcastic.
Is this article a joke?
you mention that londoners will have to pay for free wi-fi, yes us great unwashed out-of-towners from the stix sure get an easy ride, what with the very reasonable london prices.
Am pretty sure some big heads at the inquirer asked that guy to write such a lame (worst ever) article and publish it here on purpose as a piece of study on how stupidity would affect their dear readers who are just going elsewhere for news now.
Well you made me laugh a little... I'm not sure why people are getting so upset.
I don't really care if there's Wi-Fi or not as I can't stand travelling around London anyway - horrible overcrowded place that it is.
What a load of biassed drivel.
This is the most miserable and poorly written article I've read for a long time.
"A terrorism scare will work equally well"
what an absolutely absurd comment to make! What an idiot!
No under the ground reception is not possible by default seeing signals don't go there, and phones also require technical measures to be used i.e. a local 'tower'.
Surely the majority of people making VOIP calls is doing so from a mobile and could make a call regardless of there being wifi. How can an article named 'WIFI hell" only find one flaw in introducing wifi to stations and that being that its going to increase the number of 'inane shouted comments'?
I live in London. I commute by train and tube 5 days a week. Fairly often I use the DLR.
You can get a cell signal on the trains, DLR and the on the shallow/open parts of the tube network (e.g. parts of the Circle, Northern and Central lines). Only occasionally do you come across annoying users, and that's with a much larger population than those who know how to install VoIP software on their phone.
Try to get a grip on reality Rob.