Take a train and be cut off from the world
Trains in the UK have come a long way in the last 10 years. The days where you had to reach out the window and grab the outside handle to open the door (only God knows why people couldn't be trusted to have handles inside the train) and trains that were so slow that a horse and carriage way a better way to travel are almost a thing of the past (Silverlink to Birmingham is particularly slow).
At least with the introduction of Virgin Trains' Pendolino (trains with tilting technology that was supposedly invented in the UK, sold cheaply to Italians and then brought back to the UK at great expense in the form of the Pendalino), journey times to Manchester have been reduced to a little over 2 hours down from over 3.
This has changed the face of traveling to regional cities from London and put these route only 10 years behind equivalent route on the Continent. However, one thing is definitely still in the Dark Ages on these routes, mobile communications.
I have been told that this is the result of the train traveling too fast for the phone to switch cells without loosing reception and also that there is no on-train support infrastructure to compensate for the patching network coverage outside of main cities and in tunnels. I am also told that Virgin Trains has just applied a new reflective coating to their windows that not only reflects light, but also mobile phone waves.
It's amazing that as a part of the privatisation and franchising of train routes, which occurred in the last 10 years, and the advent of a digital age there wasn’t some requirement to ensure that people were connected with the outside world while on the train.
I estimate that the UK must loose at least a few million hours of productivity a year as a result of people's inability to work seemlessly on the train. Not to mention the stress involved (I have almost blown a gasket trying to have a business call on at least a number of occasions).
My advice to the government is to force train operators to install the required infrastructure on at least the main route (London to Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds as a minimum). This will not only lead to an increase in train use for business (who wouldn't take the train if it was like being in a mobile office?), but also put the UK in line with the leading countries in Europe (there are pay phones on trains in Germany).