Taipei City Government

The Department of Information Technology (DOIT) joined hands with Taipei Rapid Transit Corporation (TRTC), HwaCom Systems, and Free Ad WIFI to introduce the nation’s first “MRT WI-FI 230” trains this October!

A total of two Wi-Fi 230-enabled trains will be running on the Songshan Line, allowing commuters to access free 4G WI-FI broadband connection service.
The two partner companies have also installed facilities offering the same service at 8 metro stations across the city, including MRT Taipei Zoo, Technology Building, Daan, Nanjing Fuxing, Taipei City Hall, Ximen, Gongguan, and Taipei 101/World Trade Center stations.

According to DOIT, the MRT WI-FI 230 is a pilot project that will be conducted from today until the end of February in 2017. Commissioner of Information Technology Lee Wei-bin pointed out that the pilot program does not take up any city government budget and is based on the spirit of “private sector pioneers with the support of the government.”
Following plausibility assessment and review, the two private sector partners signed up for the project, offering commuters the option of clicking on city government and public information ads to access free WI-FI services at the aforementioned stations and trains for the duration of project period.

Taipei City Government has worked on providing public area free WI-FI connection for a long period of time, as well as encouraging citizens to develop the habit of accessing city services and city information by connecting to the Internet through wireless broadband connection. Selected public venues (such as MRT stations and outdoor commercial districts) have seen growing number of people accessing the wireless broadband connection.

The stable number of users convinced private companies to deploy their respective free WI-FI hotspots. The addition of these hotspots to the existing public WI-FI network helps Taipei’s wireless network develop into “hot zones.”

With the establishment of the Taipei Free WI-FI Alliance in 2015, the city government has since worked on the integration of public and private WI-FI hotspots. A total of 13 private companies and providers joined the alliance, thereby effectively expanding the number of accessible hotspots of the public WI-FI network to 3000.

Through the WI-FI 230 Project, DOIT and TRTC will continue to tally the results of the pilot program during the trial period. These data will not only serve as important reference for the city government in its pursuit of public wireless broadband connection policy, it will also allow passengers taking the MRT to enjoy the convenience provided by the city government.

To Access MRT WI-FI 230:
The 8 MRT stations and 2 trains offering the free 4G WI-FI connection can be identified by posters or standing cardboard cutouts featuring the mascot character of DOIT “230.”
To utilize the service, simply turn on the smartphone WI-FI connection and connect to hotspots with “230” in the title, logging on with either your Taipei Free or Facebook account. The maximum time per connection is 30 minutes, and the cap on upload and download is 3Mbps.