London Underground To Gain Full Mobile Phone Coverage By 2024 (macrumors.com) 42
London Underground passengers will be able to get mobile coverage across the rail network by the end of 2024, it has been announced. MacRumors reports: In a press release, Transport for London (TfL) said the capital's Oxford Circus, Tottenham Court Road and Bank stations would be among the first fully connected stations by the end of the year, followed by Tottenham Court Road, Euston, and Camden Town by the end of 2022. Mobile reception was introduced on the eastern half of the Jubilee line in March last year. TfL says the additional infrastructure will support 5G as well as 4G, but that it will be the responsibility of mobile operators to offer support for the fastest network speeds.
TfL is partnering with BAI Communications (BAI), a global provider of 4G and 5G connected infrastructure, to plug so-called coverage "not-spots" in the underground network. The over 1,242 miles of fibre cabling installed in London Underground tunnels will also benefit above-ground coverage for buildings and other infrastructure by allowing more mobile transmitters to be installed.
TfL is partnering with BAI Communications (BAI), a global provider of 4G and 5G connected infrastructure, to plug so-called coverage "not-spots" in the underground network. The over 1,242 miles of fibre cabling installed in London Underground tunnels will also benefit above-ground coverage for buildings and other infrastructure by allowing more mobile transmitters to be installed.
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Given that they mention Tottenham Court Rd twice, I suspect they are actually talking about sections of lines. Central line in 2021, Northern line in 2022.
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The announcement makes it clear tunnels are included:
Uninterrupted 4G mobile coverage ... will be expanded in phases to ticket halls, platforms and tunnels on the Tube network over the next three years, with all stations and tunnels due to have mobile coverage by the end of 2024.
Meanwhile in South Korea.. (Score:2)
People in Seoul in 2017 complaining about sometimes getting ONLY 10mbit free wifi on subways, but dont worry, it was fixed.
https://www.nationthailand.com/international/30325129
They also have WiMAX in subways since 2008ish
I would estimate in Seoul half the people on the subway are watching streamed media, and have been for a long time.
These days they would complain if they couldnt get 100mbit sustained..
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The US treats mobile coverage as an industry. UK too. Many other places see it as a necessity.
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Visit Northern Europe and compare. As an example, I've been getting full bars on mountain tops since 1998...
Back then, Europeans paid international roaming fees when they travelled out of their home country. Ski resorts were full of affluent foreigners with roaming turned on, so of course mobile providers installed lots of towers. There were large profits to be made.
I don't understand. (Score:5, Funny)
I don't understand, there should be full 5G coverage already, given that a significant percentage of riders have their vaccination 5G chips.
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Those still need cells to communicate with. I mean, unless they can form mesh networks... Maybe that's a feature of the Astra Zeneca jab?
Underground carriage conversation (Score:2)
B: (yelling) I can't hear you I'm on a train.
continued ad infinitum...
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Bert and Ernie were ahead of their time.
Ernie: I can't hear you Bert, I have a banana in my ear.
In before anyone moans about calls! (Score:5, Informative)
65% of the London Underground is above the ground and we're not plagued by people trying to have obxiously loud calls - mainly because the trains are so noisy it's almost impossible to hear what is going on.
Whilst you might get a few people who try to make a call, the majority of people will use their phone (just like they do today) for mobile data.
Thats only because millenials and Gen Z.. (Score:4, Funny)
... don't make phone calls any more. They're all Whatsapping! If they're phone did ring they'd probably fall out of the seat in shock and look at it as if they'd never realised it could do that!
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Based on those two groups own admission, they'd curl into a ball on the ground and stare at their ringing phone because they're terrified of talking to other people.
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Oh no we still get phone calls over here. You know HMRC scams, ISP scams, and the odd PPI scam from people who are really living in the past.
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Recruiters always call. They seem to hate email for some reason.
I turned off my voicemail because of recruiters. They fall back to email if you don't answer and they can't leave a message.
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Which line(s) is that? I regularly use District and Piccadilly Lines and have no problems with phone calls while above ground. Yes, there are plenty annoying people who talk or shout too loudly, but there are also a lot of people who don't. It's amazing how quietly I can talk with a headset on and sti
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Yup, you're definitely right about the noise levels.
Another Central line commuter by any chance? ;)
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Yep - ouch! The Central is incredibly noisy.
I have noticed you have a signal on most of the Jubilee line these days - but nobody is calling anyone when you can barely hear your own thoughts...
I have often wondered about how much hearing damage Tube travel causes.... The Central coming around the corner into Bank is unbearable
Finally! (Score:2)
The homeless people living there can finally order stuff from Amazon, while normal people use it for minutes at a time.
At least now people think the crazy homeless person is talking on the phone instead of with an invisible friend.
Re:Why is this news? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because the infrastructure is old, sometimes over 100 years old. The tunnels are tiny. Same reason as why installing air con turns out to be a really hard engineering problem for the Tube
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"Because the infrastructure is old, sometimes over 100 years old."
But the Underground Railroad in the US is nearly 200 years old
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Installing aircon *is* a relatively hard engineering problem. By comparison retrofitting some repeaters and a leaky feeder is trivial. Writing it off as 100 year sold = too hard, is American style let the old infrastructure crumble because boo hoo too hard kind of thinking. The tube is used by 2 million people daily, the cost benefit analysis should basically write itself.
By comparison the Budapest metro, which is also an 1800s era (yeah also over 100 years old) has had mobile phone coverage for over a deca
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Paris has had it for over 10 years, why is London so far behind?
Re: Why is this news? (Score:1)
From my memory, the Paris metro has significantly bigger tunnels (a lot of the London Underground tunnels are pretty much the same size and shape as the trains) and a lot nearer the surface than, certainly, the deeper London lines. Not sure how much either of those affect this issue, but it feels like they might be significant.
Milan has had this since 2009 (Score:3, Informative)
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Re: Milan has had this since 2009 (Score:3)
Not sure what has changed now. Maybe the threat level has decreased, or maybe they've reinforced the tunnels such that a typical IED won't collapse everything.
Maybe they just realised timers are a thing.
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Oh goodie. Now the blast energy will be contained within the system ensuring more casualties. This is the same principle von Stauffenberg and his cohorts tried to use against Hitler at his bunker.
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There was generally a lot of opposition to it from the public. Mostly because people hate hearing others yell "HELLO? YES! I'M ON THE TUBE!". Nobody actually uses phones for talking any more so people don't care so much.
I don't think the terrorism thing is a reason. As you point out, they could easily set bombs off with a timer after all, and the last bunch that were set off were suicide bombers.
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I thought it was about money and that nobody wanted to pay for it.
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When I looked into it about 15 years ago, I was told the London underground didn't want cell coverage because it would make it too easy for terrorists to trigger bombs at extremely critical points along the route.
Not sure what has changed now. Maybe the threat level has decreased,
Or the threat switched from the IRA to suicide bombers making safe triggering somewhat unnecessary.
or maybe they've reinforced the tunnels such that a typical IED won't collapse everything.
Unlikely: you can still see the old cast
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And while also tiny so has Budapest, but what's interesting about Budapest is that it is *also* over 100 years old. Milan's metro is comparatively a young whippersnapper.
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While it is tiny compared to London, Milan's Metro has had full mobile coverage since 2009...
https://www.atm.it/it/AtmNews/... [www.atm.it]
The problem is, for years TfL has been trying to sell their WiFi on the tube (yes, sell, as in a monthly subscription). That has been the main impediment to allowing the installation of mobile cells in the stations and tunnels. Its taken them this long to realise it's a huge failure.
Obligatory (Score:2)
It sounds like this will really help...
[removes sunglasses]
London calling
[Yeah!]
London calling to the faraway towns
Now war is declared and battle come down
London calling to the underworld
Come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls
London calling, now don't look to us
Phony Beatlemania has bitten the dust
London calling, see we ain't got no swing
Except for the ring of the truncheon thing