The world’s first fully integrated metropolitan Wi-Fi system including free roaming Wi-Fi access across the central city and on public transport has gone live in Auckland.
The city Wi-Fi network extends across all Link buses and some trains, with the announcement that Auckland Transport has joined the network with Auckland Council and Wi-Fi supplier Tomizone.
Internet on the Auckland Wi-Fi network, provided free to users due to sponsorship from Localist, has already seen strong support from Aucklanders and visitors with heavy usage in the first week of operation.
“This is a global blueprint for how a sustainable Wi-Fi network can benefit residents and visitors – even while travelling on public transport,” says Len Brown. “I’m encouraged by the number of people already using a network built by Aucklanders in under six weeks in time for Rugby World Cup.”
The Wi-Fi service is available on all new Link buses and selected trains. Over time, Aucklanders can expect to see the service expanding across the transport system and across the city.
“Being able to access the internet via this new Wi-Fi service means our customers and our visitors to the city can make more effective use of their commute time”, says Mark Lambert, Auckland Transport’s Public Transport Operations Manager.
“Auckland Transport will evaluate the success of the Wi-Fi service prior to making it more widely available across the public transport network.”, Says Mr Lambert.
“Auckland is now home to the best integrated Wi-Fi network across a city anywhere in the world and it’s something our team are very proud to have delivered in such a short time,” says Tomizone
Executive Director Steve Simms.
12 July 2011 - Aucklanders and visitors will soon be able to enjoy enhanced and expanded Wi-Fi services, offering more wireless coverage and faster access to the internet across central Auckland and it’s fringes.
Auckland Council has entered a partnership with Tomizone, Australasia’s largest Wi-Fi services provider, which will see network expansion start immediately.
The expansion will offer economic development benefits to the region and provide an important service to visitors to Rugby World Cup and beyond.
“With 85,000 visitors expected during Rugby World Cup and more than 200,000 expected from next year’s cruise season alone, visitors to Auckland will be able to step off their plane or ship and immediately access information about Auckland. For Aucklanders, it means more and better wireless internet access for portable devices such as iPads,” says Auckland Mayor Len Brown.
The Wi-Fi zone will expand into areas such as Kingsland, the entire length of Queen Street, Britomart and Queens Wharf, lower Parnell, northern Ponsonby Road, Mt Eden Village, Onehunga, key rugby training areas and selected transport hubs around Auckland.
The network will remain in place following Rugby World Cup and continue to expand to other parts of Auckland with re-investment of profits from the service.
“Auckland Council will retain control of the content, which gives it a flexible platform for the future,” says the Mayor. Service will be offered at a guaranteed discount to benchmarked market rates, with free access provided to a number of websites offering information about public services, RWC activities, tourism and transport services.
“This enhanced network coverage will be attractive to residents and our international visitors who want to use their Wi-Fi gadgets to roam around the city,” says Tomizone Executive Director Steve Simms. “Many of our visitors will want to use their roaming account from providers such as Skype, iPass and Boingo which they can do on this network.”
Tomizone and Skype today have enabled free Skype Access this week in honour of the Wireless Broadband Alliance Roundtable Conference being hosted by us Auckland.
This means that everyone can get free Internet Access until Sunday midnight GMT on any Tomizone Hotspot if they use Skype Access!
Thanks Skype!
Today we’re proud to announce that Auckland City switched on its Muni Wi-Fi network covering popular areas. This deployment is part of the Kordia network in partnership with Auckland City Council using Tomizone as the service provider to market and provide the authentication and billing services.
This is the type of business model that has already proven popular with us at Tomizone as we’ve done a similar deployment with iiNet in Australia with their partner Metromesh.
In both networks, they’ve deployed RoamAD mesh Wi-Fi solutions which easily plug into the Tomizone Service Platform. If you want more information on how Tomizone can work with a Municipal or Citywide Wi-Fi network, contact us here.
