Each line of the Moscow metro will be equipped with free Wi-Fi by the end of the year, the head of the operator developing the network told Gazeta.ru.
Wi-Fi has already been rolled out on six of the metro's 12 lines, and Boris Volpe, general director of MaksimaTelekom, said that although work is proceeding at a slower pace than initially anticipated, the company plans to provide full coverage before 2015, Gazeta.ru reported Friday.
Although the Purple, Turquoise, Circle, Yellow, Red and Light Green lines all have Wi-Fi, it only services about 18 percent of the transit system's daily traffic — about 400,000 people — according to the operator. The metro first started to install Wi-Fi aboard its trains in 2012.
Efforts to boost network coverage are also under way. In May, the Moscow city government announced a tender to achieve 100 percent coverage on existing 2G, 3G and 4G mobile networks. Mobile service is only available in 10 percent of the metro tunnels and 80 percent of the stations.
In comparison, the Beijing metro offers mobile coverage in all of its stations and in 90 percent of its tunnels, while the Paris metro — often cited as a model for Moscow's metro expansion — has achieved 95 percent coverage in its stations and 90 percent in its tunnels.
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