Will there ever be wifi on buses and DARTs?

EdenHazard

Is there any plans for this?

Fenian Army

Dublin bus are trying it on a route or two- its ****e.

Basq

There already is..

goingnowhere

All Irish Rail services will have wifi by year end

bk

They are trialling it on the 16a. I've tried it and it really is rubbish.

When you first connect, you have to answer a series of questions in a survey (which I of course lied in every question, protect your privacy) on a webpage before you can start using it.

This webpage is designed for a desktop web browser, it is not optimised for smart phone use, it is pretty difficult to use on a smart phone requiring a lot of zooming and scrolling around.

This is really stupid, it is only a few questions, it is trivial to create a version of the survey that would work better on smart phones. Better yet, don't have any survey and instead simply have the "I accept the T&C's" check box that the free wifi on Aircoach has, a quick and easy question.

When you finally connect you find it is much slower then my 3G connection on my phone.

I also found that it injects ads as a banner along the top of every web page you visit.

In summary, takes ages to connect to and is difficult to connect to, is slow and has annoying ads that take up 20% of your screen. Definitely not worth the effort if you already have 3G.

Probably ok if you don't have 3g and are on a very long journey.

charlemont

I'm sure Cork city services have wi-fi.

foggy_lad

charlemont wrote: »

I'm sure Cork city services have wi-fi.

many of the double deck Bus Eireann city buses are fitted with WiFi and there are more of these in Cork compared to Dublin.

Aard

Have tried using the trial wifi by DB twice now, and both times the screen stalled on "Connecting..." So, it didn't work. Also, bk if that's true about the banner ads, then that's just fcuking stupid. Can't believe they'd do that. Phone screens are small enough as it is.

IR wifi OTOH I've found grand both on phone and laptop.

CIE

EdenHazard wrote: »

Is there any plans for this?

You can't do without it?

Carawaystick

How does the bus connect to the Internet if there's no 3G coverage?

LXFlyer

Personally I've used it several times on the 16 and apart from the initial registration (which took the distance of 4 stops to complete), I've had no problems with it. Maybe I've just been lucky!! :-)

markpb

CIE wrote: »

You can't do without it?

Did he say he couldn't?

bk

Carawaystick wrote: »

How does the bus connect to the Internet if there's no 3G coverage?

These sort of devices usually have much larger antenna and simultaneously connect to two or more different networks for improved performance.

Yes, IR works well, however they always ask for an email address, which I always fake anyway, pointless.

The one on Aircoach I've found to be best, just a single checkbox, no email etc.

Definitely DB is by far the worst of them all.

gazzer

Travelling down from Cavan last Friday and there was Wi-Fi on the coach. I thought it was going to be crap but logged on anyway just to see. I was very surprised that it worked really well and I had a full signal for the journey.

BrianD

I fail to see the real advantages to transit operators offering these services free to the public? There's a lot of investment in infrastructure and ongoing maintinance and customer service just so the public can offload their data charges to the operator.

These services should be either charged for or get the mobile operators to pay for it or have it monetized through advertising.

And no I don't believe it will affect or entice people to public transport. It just won't.

hardCopy

What the hell do they ask in the survey?

kieran4003

Wifi will be on every single train in the country by the end of the year. In fairness, this is a great achievement - Irish Rail are way ahead of most other train operators. The 6 car ICR sets are currently being fitted. DART is being done during the Summer. The sockets on the ICR's are all being replaced at the moment due to faults.

Bus Eireann is rolling out wifi to all buses in time. All 88 new buses and coaches that are currently going into service have Wifi. The 53 new coaches all have sockets aswell.

Dublin Bus is currently doing a Wifi trial, it is fitted to a few buses. It will be sometime yet before the entire fleet will have it. I expect the new buses coming in July will have it though.

BrianD

Is there money in it for the transport services? Should be a nice earner if they are doing it properly.

CIE

markpb wrote: »

me wrote: »

You can't do without it?

Did he say he couldn't?

If he answered my question, then he'd have said either way, yes? Questions solicit answers, not the other way around.

cassel16

Hopefully the trials go well on the 16. Haven't heard much about it though a friend was saying he was using it and it was fairly quick. Anyway, with some luck they'll try it on more routes. IMO, It would make sense to provide it on the outer suburban routes such as the 65, 84 etc.

kc56

BrianD wrote: »

Is there money in it for the transport services? Should be a nice earner if they are doing it properly.

Irish Rail did a trial on the Cork route of both a free and a charged service. They didn't publish results but decided the free service was the better option probably because it might attract more people to travel by train.

None of the private coach operators charge for WiFi; if there was money to be made, I sure the profit motive would have prevailed. Free WiFi attracts costumers.

The only places where successful payed WiFi services operates are airports and hotels where business travelers on expenses are numerous. And that's not universal.

Coffeeteasugar

Think bus Eireann has wifi,
http://www.thejournal.ie/bus-eireann-rolls-out-wifi-on-88-new-buses-391612-Mar2012/

BrianD

kc56 wrote: »

Irish Rail did a trial on the Cork route of both a free and a charged service. They didn't publish results but decided the free service was the better option probably because it might attract more people to travel by train.

None of the private coach operators charge for WiFi; if there was money to be made, I sure the profit motive would have prevailed. Free WiFi attracts costumers.

The only places where successful payed WiFi services operates are airports and hotels where business travelers on expenses are numerous. And that's not universal.

Personally, I don't see it as a reason to use public transport. Most people are on a data plan so they are not planning their day on the basis of free wifi.

If they drive they don't have wifi nor can they avail of it if it was available in car - unless you're a passenger.

With wifi becoming more prevalent in mobile devices there's a demand for it. So charge for for it or get the mobile operators to pay for it.

bk

This is the reason why the wifi is free:

The private bus companies introduced free wifi, as they wanted to attract and win customers from BE and IR who had no wifi. Yes it did work and it was pretty cheap to do.

Now BE and IR are losing customers to these private companies and they are thus forced to respond (at least on intercity services). In particular it makes total sense on intercity train, where the train ticket is already so expensive and thus giving free wifi is a fraction of the cost of the ticket.

No one will start charging for the wifi, as the first company who does, will again lose customers to whichever company doesn't charge.

BTW the costs are really low, the wifi equipment costs only about €100 to €200 plus the cost of two data connections. I assume they have a special deal with the teclos for this.

I agree however it doesn't make much sense on DART and local bus services. These services aren't typically competing with anyone and I agree it is unlikely to attract anyone new to these services.

I suppose that is why the Dublin Bus trail injects ads, to help pay for it.

dgallagher

I actually managed to connect my laptop to the Internet while sitting on a Dart.

I ran a speed test on it with speedtest.net (CIE block the Irish ones :P)

Pretty slow but good enough to check emails, beware though that I am the only one on the Dart carriage and probably the only one using wifi on the train so this is as good as it gets.

Results are here http://www.speedtest.net/result/2486154742.png

Wifi on the dart is long over due but does it justify 4 Euro single fare from Bray to Clontarf?, no way :mad:. Probably the reason why I am the only one in the carriage.

BTW - I couldn't get it working on an Android phone just a linux based laptop.

Enjoy but don't expect to streaming video or even music while sitting on the dart (I guess its blocked anyway)