Travis County defined or explained please

[jeremytrent]

I have listen to the Austin/Travis County system and have a question or two. I have all the listed/available Talk Groups programmed and have not been able to understand how the APD dispatch works. On the dispatch channels for each sector there is plenty of activity, but how do you hear the transmissions of each officer.

Maybe it is better asked in comparison to Fire. It is apparent they dispatch a cal and throw it to another channel, firecom north, south....

With APD, you never hear too much detail such as officer to officer. I just wonder if I'm missing something? Or am I just not listening for the right thing. Haven't figured out how APD dispatches, so I have trouble 'following' a particular call.

Maybe, though, I'm just ignorant or untrained and everything is happening under my nose. I make NO claims to know what in the world I'm doing.

They should have a guide on how to listen to Travis county. If I understood how calls were being dispatched and received, it would all make much more sense to me. If I can know the process I can follow things. I see and hear the news station, like KVUE, and they are on scene and I didn't even hear it come across the scanner. I called once to the Assignment Desk to ask what freq's they listened to and stuff, but he just really gave me the link to here and I then used ARC to download and program the scanner.

Any suggestions or explanations that might help me?

 

[josephdavis13]

I have been monitoring the Austin Police Department with my BCD 396T radio for over three years.

In the old days when they were using the analog systems I was able to track initial dispatch assignment to a Patrol Car and Officer in a specific sector from beginning to end. I believe this was better to listen to and catch everything because each sector had it’s own frequency and all other Patrol Units had to wait their turn to speak.

Now, I don’t know this for a fact and I am only speculating but I think each Patrol Sector has more than one Talk Group ID assigned to it along with the other Trunked frequencies assigned to the System.

Based on this you might be missing parts of the transmission if the Officer presses his push to talk on his radio and gets another Talk Group ID or other frequencies assigned to that Patrol Sector based upon how a trunked radio system works.

These are just my thoughts and they might be right or wrong some others might have more information that could be helpful.

If you have another trunked scanner radio that you could use to monitor a specific Patrol Sector you might discover more then one Talk Group ID assigned to a Patrol Sector.

 

[pacrat551]

A lot of their call information is passed on via the CAD system using their MDC's. That is most likely the reason it would be hard to follow APD calls. It's kind of the same with fire (unless it's a box alarm) you usually don't hear AFD engines unless they have a problem or dispatch is updated them with additional information.

Hope this helps some.

 

[VintageJon]

Here, with the Pro96, I hit the "Pause" button and it will stay with that Talk ID. This usually allow me to track the call.
Works well for Narc and SR groups. Less so for Baker or Ida or Adam Dispatch. You can certainly stay with the Sector by doing this though. Works well for the hospital dispatch also.

Way back before the trunked P25 system you could lock on a freq and hear the whole thing. (Ahh, the old times when a Pro91 was all I needed...)

-Jon

 

[Montz816]

As was said Travis County and APD work off their MDT (Mobile Data Terminal) where the inital calls are pre-empted and the officer states if he is 10-8 (in service) or 10-76 (in route)
as for officer to officer alot can do with again the MDT using IM's . I know that with TCSO if I need to speak to a dep and it isnt going to be a quick yes no answer we go to TCSO West Tac or East Tac a back channel to not tie up dispatch incase of emergency.

Here, with the Pro96, I hit the "Pause" button and it will stay with that Talk ID. This usually allow me to track the call.


-Jon

I also use the whole notion of pausing on a channel and at times you can ride out the call without missing a beat but at times you may lose track if they go to a back channel to not tie up disp.

I know you didnt mention LCRA but we have MA/COM EDACS whitch allows us to conduct 'I-Calls' which is a independant call which works off the same idea of a phone call each one of our radios has a LID # mine is 3045 and 3047 so I could call one of my partners to ask if krispy cream now hot sign is on without all of my buddies running code to beat me there.
I know this was kinda long but I put everything I thought you may wanna know.

 

[jeremytrent]

Montz816 -

Thank you. That was pretty darn helpful. I hate to ask so many questions, but I want to learn. I've been on Chemotherapy for 15 months now and have lots-o-free-time when I'm felling well and have chosen this as my hobby, as I would be in that profession probably if I didn't have 3 types of cancer. Any other thoughts throw my way.

 

[Montz816]

No Problem Brother Any Questions You Need Feel Free To Ask To Way Of Learning Without Asking Questions.

 

[jeremytrent]

Is it pointless, living at Burnet & Ander to add and use any sites other than Simul 1 & Simul 2? I had added the creedmore and Marble Fall in, but am thinking I never show signal strength on anything other than 1, 2, Wil Co and sometime Burleson.

What is your thought? I may not understand the 'sites'.

 

[Montz816]

what I do is prog all of APF/AFD/atcems/TCSO sites into my scanner since I do alot of driving I always hit a tower. I will look on the map and try to find you a good group of towers to put in.