Accessing Content Delivery Networks for Trains On-The-Move

The reality of train travel is that trains go places where mobile networks are at their weakest. Rural areas with low population densities don’t encourage mobile operators to build out expensive 4G and 5G networks meaning there is often little or no connectivity from train to the Internet on parts of a passenger’s journey.

This provides a challenge to content delivery networks for trains particularly as web traffic is increasingly dominated by video streaming services. Caching this content on a local server has typically been the approach taken, but this has focused more on niche, regional content suppliers which struggle to meet the expectations of passengers accustomed to high quality services provided by Netflix, Amazon and BBC iPlayer.