Fargo Digital

[JoeFargo]

I talked to a Campus Policeman on Friday the 12th of August and he said Fargo/Moorhead/West Fargo will be going up with digital trunking by the end of the month. I asked how they will talk to the HP's and he said the whole state is going digital, not just Fargo/Moorhead. This is the first I've heard of that and wonder if anyone else has heard anything about it.

Also, I wonder if anyone knows of a tutorial on how to search out a new system using a Pro96. I have a connection or two, so hope to get some kind of list of talk groups, etc, but failing that I suppose a person will have to search out the whole thing.

 

[NDRADIONUT]

There Are No New Freqs / Systems In The Fcc Database For Cass County / Fargo / W. Fargo There Is A New State Freq (154.695) Listed For All Of The State Radio Sites. W Fargo Just Got A New Fire Repeater (154.280) Which Is Listed As Normal 20kc Fm There Is No Way Anything Like That (trunking) Will Happen In 2-3 Weeks. There Was Another Comment By Someone Who Said By Thanksgiving Of This Year ?? But Still There Is No New Fcc Info That Would Have To Be In Place By Now To Get Anything Done By Dec 1. I Also Heard It Was Going To Be A Slow Migration To Conventionaql Digital (cass And Clay Each Have A Conventional Dig. Rptr. So Far) Over Time ???? I Dont Know Why They Would Waste $$$$$ On Those Conventional Radios If It Were Going To Be A Trunking System ?? I Guess We Will Know When Something Happens....my Guess Is That Fargo Will Get 3 Vhf Dig Repeaters (2 For Police And 1 For Fire)

 

[JoeFargo]

It sure could be that they are just switching to digital and NOT trunking, I guess that was a leap of faith on my part. They had a story on channel 6 the other night about the new radio system going up by the end of the month. Supposedly it is costing somewhere around 6 to 8 million dollars and the biggest holdup is the time it takes to install the infrastructure, which seems to mean towers. I was really surprised when the NDSU campus cop said "the whole state is switching" as I had thought it was only the locals. A ham buddy of mine is an employee of FM Ambulance and says they have been meeting for months to discuss talk groups, etc. That would seem to indicate a trunked system, wouldn't it? I'm not looking forward to having to sell all my scanners in order to buy digital ones, but I guess there isn't much else to do. It sure will make the out of band capabilities of the ham rigs worthless around here. I also wonder how this will effect the inter-agency comms in case of some kind of homeland security issue. Time will tell.

 

[topcop]

P-25 Trunking

Here is more info than u want to know but it will explain what they plan on doing.


http://www.state.nd.us/itd/pcmc-rfp.pdf

 

[JoeFargo]

Wooo...there's a lot of info there!! It is pretty much what I was looking for though. It looks like it will be a digital system using the same freqs for the time being, with a changeover to trunked at some later date. One of these days there will be nothing but digital hash on the usual freqs and that will be the clue they've done the changover. My Pro96 should just decode it right away, unless they go encoded, which I don't think they plan to do with the dispatch freqs.

Thanks very much for the link!!

 

[N_Jay]

Here is more info than u want to know but it will explain what they plan on doing.


http://www.state.nd.us/itd/pcmc-rfp.pdf

I wonder who writes those things?

 

[Thunderbolt]

A few officials from the state of North Dakota, were out here in Michigan taking a look at our statewide system a few months ago. A person I know who is a radio tech was with them for one day, and they said that more than likely their system will be on VHF-High band, rather than 800 MHz, due to the dramatic increase in costs to add more towers for better coverage. Likewise, with the neighboring states of Montana and South Dakota being on VHF, they decided this was the best route for them to follow as well. Moreover, as I understand their current thinking on this future statewide digital TRS, it will be fully Project 25 compliant, which more than likely means they will choose Motorola as the equipment vendor.

This is great news for scanner listeners and will bring public safety communications well into the 21st Century in North Dakota.

73's

Ron

 

[N_Jay]

A few officials from the state of North Dakota, were out here in Michigan taking a look at our statewide system a few months ago. A person I know who is a radio tech was with them for one day, and they said that more than likely their system will be on VHF-High band, rather than 800 MHz, . . .

73's

Ron

LOL, "A few months ago"????? :roll:

"More then Likely"???????

They put the bid out LAST SUMMER!

He must be well connected to get the information 9 months after it is public! :lol: :lol:

 

[jason_58201]

knowing ND, all they will do is convert State Radio to digital, that is the cheapest. no trunking, no 800, just convert what we have now, the statewide duplex (and seldom repeater) system. would be nice if it was trunking though, either vhf or uhf or 800, then we could here both sides of the communications instead of just one, (unless your close).