Picture this. Every 24 hour PSAP in the state has MOSWIN capability. Carthage responding to Joplin would merely talk on their own channels until they got close to Joplin, then switch to interop channels. Dispatch advises Joplin on MOSWIN that people and resources are enroute. The Chief of the FD has MOSWIN capability, so he can update as well. The FD continues to operate on a VTAC channel, allowing perfect interoperability.
You do not WANT everyone on the same channels. You would put sector 1, operations on one channel, LGX on another, EMS on another, command on another, law on another etc. Same thing for sector 2. Not all of those need to be on the same band, nor on MOSWIN.
And no matter who works to find the needed frequencies, if they are not there, they are not there. The state APCO coordinator is an employee of the Department of Safety - if he cannot find the frequencies, I don't know who can. Bear in mind also, the frequencies in use have come from many sources, part 80 frequencies, part 90 frequencies, NTIA channels, part 22 channels, and National Guard frequencies.
But, no matter how hard you strain, you can only do so much. You only have a finite number of frequencies, when you consider co-channel, adjacent channel, intermod, spacing, etc.
In your scenario, who did you think is going to pay for the extra MOSWIN sites in Carthage? The state has their mobile coverage, they have NO reason to pay for more sites, so the cost would fall on Carthage. Two complete sites, and a minimum of $1250.00 per single band P25 Trunking VHF radio, the Nexedge solution is by far cheaper for the city.
P25 is the standard for public saftey. By going Nexedge trunking they are locking themselves to one manufacurer. Kinda of like when Joplin went 800mhz trunking in 93 wich was a proprietary system and only Motorola radios could be used on the system. Everyone was up in arms about the change. In 2007 I believe it was Joplin went with an APCO P25 trunked system thus a non proprietary system. Allowing people to pick and choose there manufacture. I never said that nexedge was a bad technology, but it has it's place in manufacturing, taxi, towing. Not public saftey, same goes with Mototrbo.
It is not just Fire we are talking about, the ability for jurstictions to talk to one another on the fly by simply changing to Example county wide pusuit talkgroup, or EMS that same abilty Mass incident talkgroup. Or a town strickened when a tornado rips thru town. Eliminating a third party dispatcher so they can handle the 911 calls. The ability for Public saftey officers to talk directly to each other, can save lives. Eventually users will be able to visitor roam onto another states system across state lines if the need was there.
As far as cost for two site in Carthage, they may have been very suprised on how cheap a P25 site costs. It sounds like they just jumped on the nexedge sales man sales pitch with out doing just a little research. As far as carthage paying for the sites, I guarantee you there would be grants avaliable that would pay for most if not all the costs of the sites and the radio's.
Again P25 is the nation wide standard for public saftey. The reason for this, is back before digital was even talked about. All we had to worry about was what band an agency was on, and that was not dificult to overcome.
Once digital was on the horizon APCO (Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials) decided they needed to create a standard for digital. If they did not we would be facing not only what band a agency was on but now, what digital format there using. Thus we have P25 and now Phase 2 TDMA of P25 being implemented on some systems. And I am willing to bet eventually on MOSWIN. As they move P25 into the future they are making sure it is bacwards compatible. And because its APCO, Public saftey has a say in how the technology grows and what features they would like.
Nexedge on the other hand is not governed by APCO. Kenwood can take the technology any direction they want. Without the input of any Public Officials
Yes you can still be interop on the same band in convetional analog, but when all the repeaters have gone digital. Now your talking simplex, it does not talk very far, great for on scene comm though and highly recommended. But that is not the point.
If I had the decision to make it would be P25 site's using either MOSWIN or Joplin as the Master with Kenwood P25 Trunked radio's. That is if Kenwood was the chepeast P25 radio Bid. Out of ICOM, TAIT, THALES, EFJOHNSON, MIDLAND, RELM, BK RADIO, SIMOCO, VERTEX, DATRON, CASSADIAN and MOTOROLA just to name a few. Oh and from what I understand Nexedge radio's can be flashed to do P25 trunking.
And as far as everyone being on the same channel or same band I never said, or implied that.
