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Dear God these people are cretins

Rail passengers in England could lose wifi access amid cost cuts
DfT tells operators wifi is low priority for travellers and they need to justify business case for it

WiFi on trains vastly increases productivioty. It’s the reason we don;t have to worry about making the trains faster. Sheesh.

23 thoughts on “Dear God these people are cretins”

  1. More conspiracy inclined minds could suggest it’s a last ditch attempt to justify HS2. But it’s probably just utter stupidity.

  2. Bloke in the Fourth Reich

    Massive mobile data packages don’t make it a bit obsolete?

    Bloke in the Fourth reich in LIS.

  3. Following BiFR, low security free WiFi probably is a low priority compared to unlimited secure data WiFi on the business or freelance mobile you’re teathered to.

  4. Mobile coverage can be very variable on rail lines, as the cell towers are usually sited for road rather than rail use. Having said that the rail wifi probably relies on a mobile network for its service, until they realise that Starlink may be a better option. As a point of interest, when I read Guido’s site using Greater Anglia’s train wifi recently, all the Youtube inserts on his items didn’t resolve. So there is DNS filtering, at least for high bandwidth sites.

  5. Deep cuttings play havoc with 4g connections, as anyone who has travelled from Gatwick Airport to Victoria will know

  6. If this was Korea, or Singapore, or one of those Asian countries that seem to be mysteriously able to somehow build infrastructure for the benefit of their own people, we’d stop fannying around with 802.11 and just run fibre along the tracks.

    Wire every appropriately spaced pole with a 5G mast.

    Job done.*

    *Well, yes, somebody has to pay for it, but it would probably be orders of mag cheaper than HS2, and the technical risk of the project is basically nil

  7. Tractor Gent said:
    “rail wifi probably relies on a mobile network for its service,”

    Think it must do, at least down here; the train Wi-Fi tends to cut out in the same places where my mobile signal does.

    Years ago there was a proposal to send the signal through the rails themselves, so you’d always have Wi-Fi whenever you were on a train or a station. Don’t know what happened to that, but perhaps there were genuine technical reasons.

  8. OT: The Belt is running out of Road – China is calling in loans to many (3rd world) countries. I just read this on Slashdot but the actual article is on Fortune.

    It was only a matter of time, and now the Chinese have these countries even more by the balls if they default.

  9. I’ve tried the train wifi for my commute. Slow and just as reliable as my mobile phone’s 4G connection. I’ve already paid for unlimited data on my package so there’s no point using the train’s wifi which I would have to share with other passengers. The only people who’d use a train wifi are those who don’t depend on an internet connection. So it can be slow for them as they won’t be watching videos or gaming or facetiming.

  10. TG – A dozen poor countries are facing economic instability and even collapse under the weight of hundreds of billions of dollars in foreign loans, much of them from the world’s biggest and most unforgiving government lender, China.

    How unlike the home life of our own dear IMF.

  11. Similar to Tractor, when I’ve been on a bus or train, there’s filtering at one end or the other that stops me connecting to the various forums I use. To the websites you use you’re just part of the great unwashed on the same bus, and your network address will be banned for any actions performed by any of your previous co-users.

  12. Steve

    ‘which has kept other major lenders from stepping in to help’ – in other words, wicked whites must pay!!

    Needless to say, I’d just shrug and say, ‘You’re on your own, sucker. That’s what independence means.’

  13. “WiFi on trains vastly increases productivioty.”

    Most of the available bandwidth is eaten up by watching TikTok and alllll the other forms of streaming content.
    And, as with anything Free…. you’re the Product..

    My experience** is that you’re better off with whatever cell reception you have, at nominally better security.

    **No drivers’ license, no car, so for me it’s been walk, bike, or public transport for decades.
    The latter is why I *never* commit to a time, sometimes even a date. And always bring a book. You learn…

  14. Bloke in North Dorset

    I still don’t buy the productivity argument that everyone need to be connected when travelling for the at most 2 hours between major conurbations where mobile does work. If you can’t make yourself productive off line for a couple of hours you’re either a poor manager or being badly managed. We’re always being told that being permanently connected is unhealthy and a distraction.

    And the problem won’t get fixed. I’ve been in meeting with senior people from all four MNOs, senior managers and engineers from British Rail, senior civil servants and top Spads with instructions from the Secretary of State (DCMS) to make it happen, and they still couldn’t find an affordable solution that the safety people would sign up to.

  15. TfL are putting 4/5g signals on all underground lines by the end of 2024. That would be a much more integrated solution here too than wifi on trains, especially with the login and security issues of wifi. Just encourage the phone companies to install the relevant hardware on track or train… appreciate there are some technical challenges here, but wifi in public is a bit 2010.

  16. BiND,

    “I still don’t buy the productivity argument that everyone need to be connected when travelling for the at most 2 hours between major conurbations where mobile does work. If you can’t make yourself productive off line for a couple of hours you’re either a poor manager or being badly managed. We’re always being told that being permanently connected is unhealthy and a distraction.”

    If you’re writing code, it’s definitely useful to have the internet in order to google snippets or reference material. But even then, really strong uptime isn’t that critical. I just use my phone simply because it’s good and I know there’s no filtering unlike the train wifi.

    “And the problem won’t get fixed. I’ve been in meeting with senior people from all four MNOs, senior managers and engineers from British Rail, senior civil servants and top Spads with instructions from the Secretary of State (DCMS) to make it happen, and they still couldn’t find an affordable solution that the safety people would sign up to.”

    Yarp. It’s a bloated government bureaucracy. You don’t really want to go around firing the safety people without good reason but the safety people can be overzealous in any organisation.

    This all shows what bullshit “rail privatisation” is. The government is micromanaging the wifi. Go on a bus, you might get wifi. Like I think the Oxford to London bus has it. You don’t really need wifi for a 10 minute bus ride, though.

  17. Bboy – when reading the “news”, I try to remember Cui Bono? (Who is Bono?)

    The PR campaign against Chinamen lending money to Africans is not about helping Africans. It’s about trying to reduce Chinese influence in Africa.

  18. And the big thing they’re missing is not doing dynamic pricing. Taking the National Express a few times made me realise how they are cheaper but make a profit. The coaches are about half full or better.

    Rail would rather charge £50 a ticket and have 3 people in a carriage, National Express will charge £20 and have it half full. Less per seat, but more money overall.

    It’s why people can fly to Milan than go to Wolverhampton at some times. Wizz would rather take £30 than £0.

    The only real answer is greed pig capitalists running the trains.

  19. I’d agree with you Steve. I do remember commenting, at the horrid news that the Chinese were investing in Zimbabwe, that they deserved each other.

  20. Aye, Wifi in trains is usually back-hauled over mobile (4G), so the coverage challenge is the same.

    Network Rail was generally keen to assist in mobile coverage on major train routes, and we did lots for the Heathrow link. Cuttings and tunnels are tricky, so is trackside work. But it was seen as part of a good traveller exoperience, amking train travel a better choice (sell more tickets).

    By contrast, the Tube lot wanted to levy massive ‘roaming’ fees on ‘their’ mobile network, which they wanted the MNO to pay for! They also tried to get Huawei to pay for it, but the UK Gov wasn’t keen. Having just been bled white for 3G spectrum, none of the UK MNO was overjoyed at freeloaders using their expensive spectrum and making the owners pay for the privilege!.
    Add in restrictive practices on site labour, and very restricted equipment limits (space, heat, power) and the whole thing was an invitation to lose money. Couldn’t walk away fast enough.

    Things may have changed, perhaps. But TfL still seem to be of the ‘milk the bastard customers’ mindset.

  21. Machiii: “low security free WiFi”

    If you’re trusting the wifi you’re already doing it wrong. Typically you VPN to the office network, for example.

  22. “If you can’t make yourself productive off line for a couple of hours”

    Opportunity cost. You’re more productive on-line than off. And if you’re not substantially more productive on-line than off, you’re not taking enough advantage of the Internet.

  23. Bboy – I’m sure they do.

    Incidentally I think I may have whiplash from the British government’s flippity floppity spasms on China. 5 minutes ago, they were our new best pals and we couldn’t get enough of them investing in British energy and telecoms. Now Rishi says they’re the “biggest challenge” to “global security”.

    (Translation: we want to regime change and/or kill them)

    This is the new Great Game. It’s a lot more passive aggressive than the old Great Game.

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