Bus Wifi

[ooo]

On most of the First buses here in Bristol there is WiFi and surprisingly this is often quite fast.

What other places and operators have Wifi and what are your experiences of using it?

 

[Bungle965]

On most of the First buses here in Bristol there is WiFi and surprisingly this is often quite fast.

What other places and operators have Wifi and what are your experiences of using it?

First Manchester also has it along with real time info.
The wifi is okay i find that if i still have data on my phone i will use that because it is not any faster than the wifi.
Sam

 

[Zoidberg]

On most of the First buses here in Bristol there is WiFi and surprisingly this is often quite fast.

What other places and operators have Wifi and what are your experiences of using it?

I used Lothian Buses' WiFi service in Edinburgh at the weekend. It did what I needed it to and for free, so no complaints.

 

[tbone]

NCT have wifi across their entire fleet
True t Barton have it on an increasing number of routes, the newer installations are 4g wifi which I find to be much better than some of the older stuff, such as the system on the soon to be replaced Red Arrow coaches.

 

[Bungle965]

I have to say though that i value plug and usb sockets over wifi anytime though. Bus companies do seem to make a big deal out of there being free wifi on there buses.
Sam

 

[Zoidberg]

I have to say though that i value plug and usb sockets over wifi anytime though. Bus companies do seem to make a big deal out of there being free wifi on there buses.
Sam

I imagine that a charging facility could be useful during a coach journey, but suspect bus journeys are too short for such a facility to be of much practical use.

 

[507021]

Arriva North West is introducing WiFi across its fleet. All new buses are now fitted with it as standard since around late 2014, as well as buses that have been refurbished to "Sapphire" specification. A few other batches of vehicles are fitted with WiFi too. I've never had any problems with it at all, it's always worked whenever I've wanted to use it.

 

[Diplodicus]

First in Southampton.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Arriva Yorkshire have WiFi on selected routes round me: the 268/268A Bradford to Dewsbury/Wakefield has had for a couple of years now, with 202/203 Huddersfield to Leeds via Dewsbury and 126/127 Wakefield to Dewsbury being added in the last couple of months. A few local arriva routes in Wakefield have WiFi too. First in Huddersfield have it on their newest vehicles and TigerBlue (formerly K-Line) have fitted it to some quite old vehicles. Yorkshire Tiger have WiFi on their latest Solos based at Elland depot.

 

[Strathclyder]

The majority of First Glasgow's E300s have free Wifi installed (as far as I'm aware). Never had any problems with it when I've needed to use it, except during periods of high demand, of course.

 

[cool110]

Around Preston I've only used it on the odd occasions when Stagecoach have put an X2 branded bus on the local 2 route, speed was quite good but I suspect no one else was using due to the route not normally having it.

 

[ValleyLines142]

Cardiff Bus, First Bristol and First Cymru have free wifi. Cardiff Bus' Enviro 400MMCs have free wifi AND USB charging ports, the same for the Scania OmniCity Artics 601-604 (Baycars).

 

[Rapidash]

Down here in the hinterlands, its currently limited to Stagecoaches Gold services, and some of the suburban Exeter routes which recently got new Solos.

I've used the one of the Gold on occasion, it has a decent speed, comparable to the Cloud on a good day.

 

[iantherev]

Going by my experience of the cloud that must mean it's slower than an ex Hong Kong Olympian climbing Telegraph Hill!

 

[WelshBluebird]

I imagine that a charging facility could be useful during a coach journey, but suspect bus journeys are too short for such a facility to be of much practical use.

In the past you'd be right. But with the quick charging technology that has been coming out recently we are looking at modern phones charging 50% within half hour, so even a short bus journey can give you enough time to get useful amounts of charge.

 

[Antman]

Arriva North West is introducing WiFi across its fleet. All new buses are now fitted with it as standard since around late 2014, as well as buses that have been refurbished to "Sapphire" specification. A few other batches of vehicles are fitted with WiFi too. I've never had any problems with it at all, it's always worked whenever I've wanted to use it.

Arriva Sapphire routes in Kent have charging points, whether they always work is another matter though!

 

[jon0844]

In the past you'd be right. But with the quick charging technology that has been coming out recently we are looking at modern phones charging 50% within half hour, so even a short bus journey can give you enough time to get useful amounts of charge.

That's true, but to be truly useful it would likely be better for buses, coaches etc to have a retractable lead that you just pull to connect - rather than having to bring your own lead/adapter.

Of course they'd be ripped off in seconds, so it can't and won't happen, but it would be nice. Especially once we have all devices using USB-C (including Apple) so there will only need to be ONE type of cable.

Pie in the sky thinking though.

Out of interest, where are the power sockets on buses?

 

[tbone]

That's true, but to be truly useful it would likely be better for buses, coaches etc to have a retractable lead that you just pull to connect - rather than having to bring your own lead/adapter.

Of course they'd be ripped off in seconds, so it can't and won't happen, but it would be nice. Especially once we have all devices using USB-C (including Apple) so there will only need to be ONE type of cable.

Pie in the sky thinking though.

Out of interest, where are the power sockets on buses?

People also tend to pass the time on their phones whilst on the bus which can drain the battery rather quickly so even keeping it at the same level as when you got on is a bonus. Casual users may not have cables but commuters and students might in order to charge their devices at work/uni.

Sockets are in different places dependent on the product, a popular one is the BUSB system (see what they did there ) which is what Trent Barton have on their Rainbow One, Zoom and Villager routes. These are fitted in between the two seats in front of the passenger. Their Skylink Citaros have three point and usb chargers underneath the seats in front.

 

[ooo]

People also tend to pass the time on their phones whilst on the bus which can drain the battery rather quickly so even keeping it at the same level as when you got on is a bonus. Casual users may not have cables but commuters and students might in order to charge their devices at work/uni.

Sockets are in different places dependent on the product, a popular one is the BUSB system (see what they did there ) which is what Trent Barton have on their Rainbow One, Zoom and Villager routes. These are fitted in between the two seats in front of the passenger. Their Skylink Citaros have three point and usb chargers underneath the seats in front.

Do these plug sockets and USB sockets have a high power consumption?

 

[Zoidberg]

Do these plug sockets and USB sockets have a high power consumption?

The sockets will not consume power. What is plugged into them will.

Is the question about what capacity to draw power is available, about what maximum current is available at the voltage appropriate to the type of socket?

 

[Be3G]

Living in TfL land (otherwise known as, err, London) all this talk of WiFi on buses surprises me because TfL generally keep their finger on the pulse of technology, yet we have no WiFi on buses at all. There was a short trial last year on two buses (not bus routes, just buses) and a further five buses temporarily received WiFi equipment down to some sponsorship thing but that's it. Apparently though TfL think WiFi on their buses is perfectly doable, they just don't want to fund it – which I concede is fair enough.

 

[jon0844]

They have a lot of buses so it wouldn't be cheap. There's clearly a cost for the equipment and also the data charges.

I could see TfL trying to do something with a network though to perhaps showcase their ultra fast 4G networks (ie providing the data for free with a pop up window to advertise it), but at the same time, said networks would probably rather people just used their network in the first place direct and cut out the middle man. After all, buses don't spend much time in areas with no cellular coverage in London.

I can imagine power sockets being another issue too. The buses can be very busy and people hop on and off regularly given bus travel is pretty cheap so it's usable even for very short hops. Imagine people getting tangled up!

 

[Be3G]

I don't really see that power sockets have anything to do with WiFi though. If anything I'd suggest WiFi helps reduce the need for sockets, as battery efficiency when networking is higher for a phone on WiFi than one using cellular data. You make a good point though that to a certain extent WiFi on buses probably isn't needed owing to the better mobile network coverage.

I remember when, last decade, The Cloud made the whole of the City of London in to one big WiFi hotspot – does that still work? Was very handy when commuting through the area by bus, back before 3G data was ubiquitous.

 

[ooo]

The sockets will not consume power. What is plugged into them will.

Is the question about what capacity to draw power is available, about what maximum current is available at the voltage appropriate to the type of socket?

Sorry for the bad wording. What is the maximum current available for the sockets

 

[Dai Corner]

Sorry for the bad wording. What is the maximum current available for the sockets

According to the USB Power Delivery Spec a socket should be able to supply up to 100W so 70 sockets would be 7kW. A bus engine might deliver, say, 350hp or 260kW so in theory about 3% of the engine's power could be used to power passengers' devices.

 

[jon0844]

I don't really see that power sockets have anything to do with WiFi though. If anything I'd suggest WiFi helps reduce the need for sockets, as battery efficiency when networking is higher for a phone on WiFi than one using cellular data. You make a good point though that to a certain extent WiFi on buses probably isn't needed owing to the better mobile network coverage.

I remember when, last decade, The Cloud made the whole of the City of London in to one big WiFi hotspot – does that still work? Was very handy when commuting through the area by bus, back before 3G data was ubiquitous.

You don't need one for the other, but I guess power sockets will eventually just become a standard thing - or at least USB ports.

I don't think there's blanket Wi-Fi in the City of London anymore, and one problem is that Wi-Fi is so easily congested (not so much at 5GHz) and it doesn't work so well when you're moving.

By comparison, you've now got pretty decent LTE-A from EE and Vodafone that is nearly always going to work better.

 

[Bill EWS]

I travelled on the county buses from Aberdeen to Fraserburgh and Peterhead a couple of weeks back. Never did get the 'free' Wi-Fi to work. On one bus I asked a young lad who was using his iPhone how to get it working and he said to "Forget It, it hardly ever worked". However I got myself one of these new Mobile Wi-Fi Modems and use it on Pay As You Go and it works every time. I have used free Wi-Fi in a couple of hotels and a few pubs and they worked OK.

 

[Hophead]

Living in TfL land (otherwise known as, err, London) all this talk of WiFi on buses surprises me because TfL generally keep their finger on the pulse of technology, yet we have no WiFi on buses at all. There was a short trial last year on two buses (not bus routes, just buses) and a further five buses temporarily received WiFi equipment down to some sponsorship thing but that's it. Apparently though TfL think WiFi on their buses is perfectly doable, they just don't want to fund it – which I concede is fair enough.

Provincial operators tend to offer wi-fi as a way to entice passengers on board (or stop them from straying to cars or trains). There's clearly a commercial return on this. TfL simply don't need to attract custom in this way, even accepting the different funding arrangement. In London, pretty much everyone who's likely to use a bus is probably doing so already and free wi-fi is unlikely to get anyone on board who's currently travelling by other means.

 

[radamfi]

You make a good point though that to a certain extent WiFi on buses probably isn't needed owing to the better mobile network coverage.

Whenever I travel on trains and buses with WiFi I rarely use it as I have my own data which is likely to be faster, more reliable, no need to agree to any terms and conditions and there are the inherent risks in using public WiFi generally. Very few people with smartphones don't have access to their own data and even with pay as you go you would only be saving a few pence by using the bus WiFi. Possibly for foreign tourists who don't want to pay for roaming, but even for them there is the option of buying a local SIM card. I would prefer bus companies to spend the (admittedly small amount of) money on improved services rather than bus WiFi.

 

[Carlisle]

Sorry for the bad wording. What is the maximum current available for the sockets

I don't know any figures but I do know that on some if you try plugging in something heavy duty like a large power tool etc your likely to trip the system out so they're clearly only designed for low current items