PA Statewide P25 Plans

Following some comments in the DCNR thread, I thought this would be a good place to discuss the new P25 system in the works.

who won the contract for this TRS? Harris or Motorola?

Request for information for a dream was requested. No money budgeted this year, going to the Gov's Office for Yea or Nay next cycle... At least two years till someone is selected. So, put this on hold for a while.. the other option is keep OpenSky, pray Harris gets all the problems worked out and spend a ton of money piece mailing other systems into this one.

I predict over a billion taxpayer dollars will be squandered before they walk away from this proprietary schlock. What with radios becoming "obsolete" so quickly, an obvious ploy to keep the cash rolling in, and more than likely even more microsites needed to make it even work. What a mess these politicians have created by not asking for expert opinion and trusting salesmen.

Amazing how slow the wheels turn. Must be still spending money on
the open sky system. Several weeks ago a tower crew appeared at the local
PADOT building and erected a real nice 120 foot tower next to the 60 ft utility
pole that was holding their open sky antenna. The antenna was transferred
to the tower and remained there for about two weeks.
A short time ago the tower crew again appeared, put the antenna back on
the pole, removed the tower and departed. Increased coverage test ?
Had a notion to stop and see if they could move the tower to my back yard
since I'm a tax payer in good standing (I think) This is the kind of thing movies
are made of........ Stay tuned.

rrbum said:

I predict over a billion taxpayer dollars will be squandered before they walk away from this proprietary schlock. What with radios becoming "obsolete" so quickly, an obvious ploy to keep the cash rolling in, and more than likely even more microsites needed to make it even work. What a mess these politicians have created by not asking for expert opinion and trusting salesmen.

Click to expand...

It's funny that you mention radios becoming obsolete "so quickly". All the M-803 mobile radios will be at "end of life" or no longer officially supported by Harris at the end of this year. Maintenance contracts in place will require the repair shops to be able to service these radio for a few more years after that. But...there is a sudden need for hundreds (thousands?) of new mobile radios to replace the M-803's in service all over the place. That's a lotta dough.

benrussellpa said:

It's funny that you mention radios becoming obsolete "so quickly". All the M-803 mobile radios will be at "end of life" or no longer officially supported by Harris at the end of this year. Maintenance contracts in place will require the repair shops to be able to service these radio for a few more years after that. But...there is a sudden need for hundreds (thousands?) of new mobile radios to replace the M-803's in service all over the place. That's a lotta dough.

Click to expand...

Our lovely Pa government in all it's glory! I hope whatever they come up with finally fixes the mess they created! If any of us are even still alive by then. LOL

If the new system doesn't need all of the gapfiller towers that OpenSky requires perhaps some of the cost of the new system can be defrayed by selling the unneeded sites to tower leasing companies. Another means of helping to reduce costs would be to sell limited access to some transit and utility providers, much as the Commonwealth does now with OpenSky - but only if the system has sufficient capacity to handle the non-essential traffic without reducing functionality for 1st responders and essential users.

chankel said:

If the new system doesn't need all of the gapfiller towers that OpenSky requires perhaps some of the cost of the new system can be defrayed by selling the unneeded sites to tower leasing companies. Another means of helping to reduce costs would be to sell limited access to some transit and utility providers, much as the Commonwealth does now with OpenSky - but only if the system has sufficient capacity to handle the non-essential traffic without reducing functionality for 1st responders and essential users.

Click to expand...

The state already has a process in place to lease space on their owned towers. Many sites are on leased space though so they would save by cancelling those leases.

Trunking is already pretty efficient so space should be available for other users. Going straight to P25 phase 2 would help that efficiency even more. Although I understand it would be a downgrade of sorts since the current crap is 4+ slots per rf channel.