The WiRover project, led by Professor Suman Banerjee of the Computer Sciences Department, has been turning two Madison Metro and one Van Galder bus into roving WiFi hotspots.
The project is meeting the technical challenges of these highly mobile settings and is improving robustness, connectivity, and availablility of Internet services - for passenger infotainment and for applications that enhance safety, navigation, and traffic awareness.
Banerjee's laboratory, Wisconsin Wireless Networking Systems Laboratory or WiNGS, has been working with public transit systems to refine the technology.
A recent Wisconsin State Journal article highlights the growing interest surrounding this project, "Metro tests wireless service on buses" (Oct. 23, 2010).
More details on WiRover can be found at:
http://www.cs.wisc.edu/wings/projects/wirover/