East Midlands Trains has announced this week that it has finished testing wireless internet on its trains and will now be providing WiFi-access to passengers on select routes.
The service has been fitted on all six of the company's seven-car Meridian trains that run high-speed routes between London St Pancras and Nottingham or Sheffield. While this only represents a small proportion of the company's rolling-stock, the remaining 21 Meridian trains and 11 HSTs will be upgraded over the coming months.
According to Jayne Moyses, EMT's Sales Manager, "we're constantly looking at how we can further improve our service and we know the launch of on board internet access will make a real difference for our passengers".
Access is free for all first-class passengers, or £4 for those in standard class for up to three hours. A day pass is also available, providing unlimited use of the service for £7.50.
The system connects through multiple 3G-networks, meaning that the bandwidth should be more than enough for some light browsing or catching up on e-mails.
Of course, East Midlands isn't the first operator to provide internet access on its trains. Both East Coast and Virgin Trains offer WiFi on their entire fleets, with the former providing the service for free to all passengers. Rival CrossCountry Trains is in the process of trialling WiFi networks but has reportedly been fined several times for failing to meet Government deadlines.
