Mobile coverage on railways - reforms under Labour

[Gigabit]

Now we've got a government not afraid of changing the planning system and the railways, I thought it might be good to talk about how we improve the laughably poor coverage on the UK railway network.

I would start by allowing taller masts and by allowing masts to be built more easily on Network Rail/GBR land, use their assets etc.

What else needs to be done?

 

[Western 52]

Presumably allowing mobile masts on NR land would generate useful income as well as improving coverage for passengers? Sounds like a win win to me, but may generate objections from railway neighbours.

 

[dosxuk]

Mobile phone masts are expensive - where to site them is a commercial decision by the network operators. Given the choice of a new mast serving a town of a few thousand (who could be tempted to switch network by having a better signal), or a couple of hundred passengers for a few seconds four times an hour, it's obvious where they're going to focus their efforts.

Furthermore, it's not the land ownership for masts that's the issue when the networks do decide to serve an area - it's the getting planning permission. And while Network Rail has fairly wide ranging exceptions for needing permission, that is only for infrastructure that is critical to the operation of the railway. A mobile phone mast for public use on Network Rail land would still require full planning permission, giving the locals plenty of opportunity to object.

 

[poffle]

Need to have base stations on the trains. Probably leaky feeder stuff ( co-ax )!to distribute stuff through trains. Then backhaul antennae on the outside of the train.

Most base stations in urban areas are tiny and look more like a burglar alarm box on the front if a building and cover maybe 50M range.

Getting signals to lots of individual devices inside a moving metal box is difficult.

You can justify putting a more sophisticated backhaul antenna on a train when it is serving several hundred phones.

Also if it's difficult to get a signal out the phone will increase its power. Most of the radiation received by humans come from our own phones because they are much closer to us. Perversely people who put up electromagnetic shielding are actually likely to be receiving more electromagnetic radiation because their phone ups it's transmit power to get through the shielding.

 

[Skie]

Being able to re-use the GSM-R masts for commercial reasons would be a sensible planning change. NR (or whatever they become) could add an extra transmitter to each mast and lease the use of it to the highest bidder across the network. I believe they have a lot of dark fibre that could allow everything to be safely isolated from safety critical infrastructure.

Not a complete fix as GSM-R benefits from trains having external antenna, and even then it isnt perfect, but it'd help kick start better coverage.

 

[CaptainHaddock]

Now we've got a government not afraid of changing the planning system and the railways, I thought it might be good to talk about how we improve the laughably poor coverage on the UK railway network.

I would start by allowing taller masts and by allowing masts to be built more easily on Network Rail/GBR land, use their assets etc.

What else needs to be done?

How about signs on the train reading "There is no mobile coverage on this train. If you want to entertain yourself, please look out of the window and enjoy the view".

In all seriousness I don't see what the big deal is. Why do you need to play with your mobile phone when you're on a train?

 

[coppercapped]

Some understanding of the way that radio waves propagate would be helpful...

If the object is to improve signal strength and reduce bit error rate to individual passengers sitting inside a long train the need is to get a satisfactory signal in through the train's windows. Transmitters arranged along side of the railway aimed at the track at window height would be the ideal layout. Transmitters close to the track would mean the handset would have to switch rapidly from one transmitter to the next which adds a lot of control overhead to the fixed part of the network so the transmitters would ideally be placed some distance back from the track. This would be OK in open countryside, but in narrow cuttings and tunnels or in tightly built up areas it's more difficult...

Transmitter masts close to the track, tall or otherwise, would be very helpful for the driver, but not much good for all the punters sitting in their Faraday cage under a steel or aluminium roof. Unless, of course, each coach has an aerial on its roof... Even this is complicated - does the aerial carry the separate conversations or are they bundled in some form?

It's not just about the planning system.

 

[SynthD]

I don’t want more blight. I’d rather this is tackled another way, eg fund fixing the WiFi.

Railways themselves aren’t a good place for the works to install a tower. They don’t have good internet or power connections. Stations, especially car parks, are better.

 

[PyrahnaRanger]

How about signs on the train reading "There is no mobile coverage on this train. If you want to entertain yourself, please look out of the window and enjoy the view".

In all seriousness I don't see what the big deal is. Why do you need to play with your mobile phone when you're on a train?

A journey from my home to say Bracknell takes around 6 hours by train, and should be a similar amount by car - the train loses out on the advantage of speed due to the route I need to take effectively doubling back on itself, something that doesn’t happen in the car.

So, if I’m visiting Bracknell, I’m going to have to go down the day before to allow myself a contingency for delays; because I can’t get back home by rail after mid afternoon, I need to stay a second night and travel back on the third day.

Out of a five day week, I’m now spending two days of it travelling. I could look at the scenery, but after a few times it starts to wain a bit. If I have my laptop, I can currently just about manage to send and receive emails, which at least allows me to be a bit productive. With a decent mobile signal, I could connect back to my office network and do a lot more work.

I tend to tether my laptop to my phone as WiFi on Avanti isn’t great, so I guess I’d be happy if that was improved instead!

Anyways, that’s why I would like a better mobile signal on trains!

 

[Djgr]

Giving that almost everything in Britain has been broken in the past 14 years and needs fixing, I hardly think that this is high on the government's to-do list.

 

[Belperpete]

The obvious issue with having mobile masts on railway land is how do the mobile co's staff get access? You can't have them wandering about a live railway.

I agree with previous posters that the real issue is to get WiFi working reliably on trains. That allows you to check connections, platforms, etc. during your journey. And of course access etickets.

 

[renegademaster]

The obvious issue with having mobile masts on railway land is how do the mobile co's staff get access? You can't have them wandering about a live railway.

I agree with previous posters that the real issue is to get WiFi working reliably on trains. That allows you to check connections, platforms, etc. during your journey. And of course access etickets.

The WiFi on trains runs off the mobile phone network presently.

You could have some form of powerline transmission but is it viable with 25kv lines ?

 

[CapitalStar378]

The WiFi on trains runs off the mobile phone network presently.

You could have some form of powerline transmission but is it viable with 25kv lines ?

I'm not sure which network GWR's wifi works off but it couldn't really be any more unreliable. Amazing that you can get good wifi on a plane but not on a train.

 

[MrJeeves]

The obvious issue with having mobile masts on railway land is how do the mobile co's staff get access? You can't have them wandering about a live railway.

Most GSM-R sites are at the side of the railway, sometimes completely outside the lineside area.

The simple and likely solution is the networks put their equipment in an area which they can access from public land, and NR have a gate to access it from the railway side. Job done.

It's worth considering that all this essentially falls under what I highlighted earlier this year when Network Rail and the mobile networks agreed a specification on how to share network infrastructure (GSM-R and mobile network coverage).

Brighton Mainline 4G/5G upgrades

The plan was always for all 4 MNOs, I believe. There's sufficient infrastructure (4 sets of radio panels) in the planning docs for this. I believe so but contractual agreements could be imposed to force them to join every site rather than a selection. Thanks, you have been a font of...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[al78]

How about signs on the train reading "There is no mobile coverage on this train. If you want to entertain yourself, please look out of the window and enjoy the view".

In all seriousness I don't see what the big deal is. Why do you need to play with your mobile phone when you're on a train?

One reason that comes to mind is if someone is meeting you at your destination station and you want to let them know you have been delayed half an hour or more, or you are heading for a meeting and similarly have an unusually long delay that has swallowed up your padding time. There could also be the situation where other people want to get in contact with you to tell you plans have changed, or an emergency situation is in place. I use my phone to periodically check train timetables and delays in real time, for example given a nuisance delay am I still likely to be able to make my connection. Plenty of reasons why someone might want the ability to use a mobile on a train that don't involve "playing".

 

[edwin_m]

Amazing that you can get good wifi on a plane but not on a train.

Wifi on a plane is much simpler. A satellite system on the roof will always have line of sight to the satellite. Railway systems have to cope with numerous ground features blocking the signal, whether from satellite or from the local base stations. But the GSM-R stations are specifically placed to give coverage of the rail route, and as mentioned above they are likely to have maintenance access without the need to go trackside, so it ought to be technically possible to make some use of them, assuming some way could be found to pay for the extra kit.

 

[coppercapped]

I'm not sure which network GWR's wifi works off but it couldn't really be any more unreliable. Amazing that you can get good wifi on a plane but not on a train.

No, it isn't 'amazing'.

Think for a minute about what surrounds an aeroplane in flight and what surrounds a train. Then ask yourself if there is a reliable line of sight from the vehicle to the transmitter and vice versa. I would have thought that the answer is clear - there are not many bridges, tunnels, sides of cuttings, station roofs and trees between the top of the fuselage of an aeroplane and a satellite.

 

[CapitalStar378]

No, it isn't 'amazing'.

Think for a minute about what surrounds an aeroplane in flight and what surrounds a train. Then ask yourself if there is a reliable line of sight from the vehicle to the transmitter and vice versa. I would have thought that the answer is clear - there are not many bridges, tunnels, sides of cuttings, station roofs and trees between the top of the fuselage of an aeroplane and a satellite.

Remind me not to go to any dinner parties that you're attending

My point was actually more about GWR wifi than general wifi on trains, it's next to useless, I get that it'll be intermittent but I can get very little at any stage during the journey from PAD to CDF.

 

[Western 52]

I used several GWR services yesterday, all with slow WiFi which took a while to connect, then crawled. Not that many passengers on some of the trains either, so it should not have been overloaded. Later, on a TFW 197 I connected quickly and it worked well.

 

[MrJeeves]

In all seriousness I don't see what the big deal is. Why do you need to play with your mobile phone when you're on a train?

I guess I shouldn't be able to work while on a train, then.

 

[Elecman]

Virtually all GSMR and FTN nodes are lineside for GDO ( development order ie no need for planning permission) rights to apply to thier installation

 

[Buzby]

A mobile phone mast for public use on Network Rail land would still require full planning permission, giving the locals plenty of opportunity to object.

I understand this has changed somewhat due to the ending of O2 Airwave and its 4-5G replacement using additional capacity on cellular networks. NR already got away with some eye-watering GSM-R sites with height to provide minimal need to infill. I doubt these could be utilised by cellular in any meaningful way, but it certainly is wasteful to retain single-purpose infrastructure these days.

 

[SynthD]

Is GSM-R a safety critical setup that can’t be shared with passengers?

 

[ricoblade]

Isn't there a trial for using Starlink (heard it on the Green Signals podcast) that if it works could revolutionise this subject?

 

[Buzby]

Is GSM-R a safety critical setup that can’t be shared with passengers?

It is on its own exclusive frequency blocks so would be of no use to existing operators - other than as a Co-located site requiring new antennae systems for public access. Theme can also provide links via a leaky feeder in tunnels which would not suffer the same way as Starlink in tunnels and deep cuttings.

 

[YorksLad12]

It is ironic that the times I most need 5G/4G - on a train or coach in the middle of nowhere - there is no adequate signal. I don't know if my iPhone drops down to 2G when I'm lost on a Scottish mountain (and I have no desire to test that theory), but that another occasion when you really need a signal, and probably won't have one. So any plan to improve coverage of hard-to-reach areas gets my vote.

Yes, we can use on-board wifi: but you have to register, and at 8pm tonight you won't be able to watch the England game because streaming services are generally banned.

 

[MrJeeves]

due to the ending of O2 Airwave and its 4-5G replacement using additional capacity on cellular networks

Not sure what O2 have to do with Airwave? It's nothing to do with them.

The 4G-5G replacement (Emergency Services Network/ESN) is nowhere near ready and isn't even in day-to-day use by any emergency services.

A mobile phone mast for public use on Network Rail land would still require full planning permission, giving the locals plenty of opportunity to object.

Not if it's 20m tall or less.

I doubt these could be utilised by cellular in any meaningful way

They'd almost certainly need to be replaced with strengthened monopoles if they were to also host MNO equipment (potentially at a lower level than the Network Rail radio equipment).

 

[Energy]

A potential model is that Network Rail provide the tower, coax from the top of said tower and potentially a fibre link to the property boundary or a gated area accessible without needing to go on the railway.

It would need to be reasonably close to a 230V DNO feed as I imagine Network Rail have no interest in providing this themselves and neither Network Rail or any mobile operator will be interested in paying for a transformer.

Antennas are up to the mobile operator but any changes require supervision from a Network Rail member of staff.

A potential problem is that, as mentioned above, any tower used would requires some level of planning permission. And most NR ones are fairly lightweight structures designed only to take the equipment for GSMR. Any new poles would need to be constructed while the railway is not operating or built alongside and without affecting the GSMR tower until it can be switched over.

 

[Ediswan]

The 4G-5G replacement (Emergency Services Network/ESN) is nowhere near ready and isn't even in day-to-day use by any emergency services.

How many years late is that now ?

 

[JamesT]

Not sure what O2 have to do with Airwave? It's nothing to do with them.

The Airwave network was built by BT and part of the company that was spun off to O2. But it has since been sold on so O2 Airwave hasn’t been true since 2007.