Japan's first WiFi trains get underway

This is one of those Holy Grail stories we've been watching develop for what seems like years: the Japanese railway industry's achingly slow progress toward getting WiFI onto its trains. Finally, though, the consortium developing wireless access for the Tsukuba Express (fittingly, the line linking one of Japan's most noted concentrations of corporate R&D with its largest consumer-electronics paradise) have announced that from August 24 their service goes into commercial operation. It will be available on around 60% of Tsukuba Express trains, to users of NTT DoCoMo's Mzone and Mopera U hotspot services. The infrastructure is 802.11b only for the moment, and speeds average out at around 1.4Mbps, though project partners Metropolitan Intercity Railway, Intel and NTT-BP seem enthusiastic about expanding the range of services on offer.

[Via Ascii24 (Japanese)]