Helpful Tower Information

[utlchris]

I recently took a road trip back to Michigan and found that I had a very easy time to program my radio for traveling through Indiana. On RR site for Indiana (Indiana Project Hoosier SAFE-T Trunking System, Statewide, Indiana - Scanner Frequencies) Under the site information it lists the county each site is located in and included in the site name.. It was very easy for me to pick the counties I would be driving though and program only those into my radio. It sure would be nice to see Colorado listed like that not only for the Colorado users but also for people coming though that might not have any clue on where some of these City's are. I know we have a few other resources that are also helpful and the County names are available if you pull up the site information. However they way Indiana had it listed made it as easy as pie.

[dirtfinder]

You mean something like this

Colorado DTRS Interstate Travel Reference - The RadioReference Wiki

[utlchris]

Originally Posted by dirtfinder

You mean something like this

Colorado DTRS Interstate Travel Reference - The RadioReference Wiki

Yeah that is helpful on our site. However if you look at this link and look under the Site information it list's each site with the county it's located in. It also worked great on my programing software as I could see the County name when I programed it into the radio.

(http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=933)

[soncorn]

The same thing is done for the Illinois Starcom system. It can be useful.

[utlchris]

Any DB Admins want to bite on his at all? Or any users besides me think this would be helpful?

[eyes00only]

Originally Posted by utlchris

Any DB Admins want to bite on his at all? Or any users besides me think this would be helpful?

I think it would be helpful.

JK

[jfab]

I concur!

[greenthumb]

Erik and I are listening to this input carefully and kicking around some ideas of our own to include this information in a more encompassing clean-up and enhancement of the information provided in the database for Colorado. Once we've devised a plan, we'll post a summary of it here.

[greenthumb]

Alright, county names are appended to the site names and they're in parentheses.

[soncorn]

Good work! Very quick too!

[jfab]

Awesome . Thanks to all involved!

[greenthumb]

Erik came up with an idea to list a small handful of sites for each county (the geographical area, not the agency) that are best to use in order to hear that county's (again, the geographical area) talk groups. I have done a bit of an example of this for the Mutual Aid, Colorado State Patrol and Adams County sections of the DTRS database. Would this be equally (or more) useful as putting the county names next to each site? I'm not crazy about how the county name looks next to the site name in the database because of how it word wraps.

[datainmotion]

Sweet!

Guess it's time to revisit the site assignments in the 996.

If anyone else uses DeLorme mapping, I'm thinking about creating a Draw Layer that should work on their Topo software (possibly Streets as well), showing all the sites statewide. If I get ambitious, I may tag the sites with the RR links to the site pages on the db.

Like I have all sorts of free time...

[kd0ege]

[Quote greenthumb] Would this be equally (or more) useful as putting the county names next to each site? I'm not crazy about how the county name looks next to the site name in the database...[quote]

I think your approach may be at least as useful, if not more, as there are many sites that are redundant in the geographical area they cover. I think that this is our states "low cost" answer to the poor propagation characteristics of 800 MHz in mountainous regions. For example, Fort Collins has the PVH, Buckhorn, and Horsetooth sites but you only need to monitor one of these to get all the local TGIDs, unless you are in a canyon or remote corner of the county. I hope this makes sense and is helpful.

Chris

[captaincraig44]

I like this tweek. Even as a Colorado native, this system has become so massive that I don't even know where half of the towers are located solely by their name alone. Good work guys! This will greatly help locals as wells as transients. This should be the norm for RR databases.

[greenthumb]

Originally Posted by datainmotion

If anyone else uses DeLorme mapping, I'm thinking about creating a Draw Layer that should work on their Topo software (possibly Streets as well), showing all the sites statewide. If I get ambitious, I may tag the sites with the RR links to the site pages on the db.

Like I have all sorts of free time...

Any way you can make a better map (or maps) than the one we're using for the sites on the DTRS database page and upload it to the Wiki? If so, I would change the map that's on the DTRS database page to it....

[greenthumb]

Originally Posted by kd0ege

I think your approach may be at least as useful, if not more, as there are many sites that are redundant in the geographical area they cover.

I tend to agree, particularly when you look at a site like Thorodin or Lookout. They are tagged as being physically in one county, but if you look at the traffic they carry, these sites are very useful for Denver metro coverage in Cities and Counties other than where the sites physically sit.

I think that this is our states "low cost" answer to the poor propagation characteristics of 800 MHz in mountainous regions. For example, Fort Collins has the PVH, Buckhorn, and Horsetooth sites but you only need to monitor one of these to get all the local TGIDs, unless you are in a canyon or remote corner of the county. I hope this makes sense and is helpful.

That's a whole other debate, but from what I recall, these are all old NCRCN system sites and they serve a purpose for foothills coverage and portable in-building coverage in Ft. Collins, even before those sites were part of DTRS. If there are radios using each of them from the same agency, that site is providing the best coverage in that area.

[utlchris]

Wow for some reason I was not getting any e-mails on this thread update and just noticed that it exploded. Thanks for the hard work at adding the County names. I agree with you and am not really crazy on how it wraps. However the benefit outweighs that as it's pretty easy to see where a tower is generally located not only for travelers but for locals who may have no clue where the Tenderfoot tower may be. Also makes it real simple for someone taking a trip say to Olathe and just plug in the towers for that county. I did notice that a lot of the wrapping issues involve the "metro Denver" towers and I'd be fine with giving up the County name on those since those towers really do blanket the Denver Metro area and I would guess most people can figure that one out. Maybe someday on a RR update they can widen up that field or add a column for the County. Thanks for the work it looks great (the information is helpful) still would like to see someday too maybe a link on the tower for the agencies that are typically received on it. I know we have gone back and forth on this with Received vs. Denied but I still feel that received is more helpful to a person so they know the tower they are programming in is more than likely to have the agency they want to listen to.

Thanks Again

[abqscan]

Greenthumb, great job on the additions to the DB! =) I think we should get user input for the entire state on the top (up to 5) sites one should monitor for the specific counties.

Should we create a Wiki Page that lists every agency in the state, and how to monitor them???

i.e. I had someone from New York visit my store and wanted info on how to monitor the local PD for Centennial but couldn't find them in the date base. I had to explain that Arap SO dispatches for them and that is who they needed to monitor.

[dracer777]

Wirelessly posted (MOT-QA30/00.72 UP.Browser/7.2.7.5.610 (GUI) MMP/2.0)

Yes, I agree, like in weld county, pretty much every agency except Greeley, gets dispatched on a "local law" TG. As a newcomer, I thought the DB was incomplete.