I hadn't visited the frequency coordination pages for the Northern California chapter of APCO (Association of Public Service Communications Officers since prior to my recent hospitalization. I'm noticing several coordination requests in Mendocino County for 800 MHz conventional repeater pairs on mountaintops by the State of California. I think I saw one for Trinity County as well. I'm wondering if they are requests being made for Caltrans. Is Caltrans going to give 800 MHz a try in Districts 1 and the western portion of District 2 again. Anyone up that direction have any idea?
800 MHz Frequency Coordination Northwest Coast and Trinity Co.
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Howdy! Since I'm practically smack in the middle of the area, I'll look up recent requests and especially those that have been granted over the past year or so, and see if I come up with anything. As we've discussed before though of course, for even halfway decent coverage on 800 they would have to blanket the place with dozens of repeaters. CalTrans and CHP do OK but not spectacularly around here on VHF-low, and the four counties' agencies are almost entirely on VHF-high repeaters featuring lotsa dead spots.
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That has been my understanding for at least 10 years and I can't imagine why any thinking would change. The trouble with coordination requests is that specifics as to what department of the state government are not always provided on the APCO site. Once APCO gives the go ahead the FCC application provides those details. If Caltrans is not the agency that is the subject of these coordination efforts the agency making these coordination requests must realize that they are going to get very limited coverage.
I remember the licenses Caltrans was issued for their attempt to provide coverage for U.S. 199 along the Smith River. In some areas highway elevation repeaters at 1-2 mile intervals were proposed.
One thing that occurs to me is that there are some freeway-type callboxes along the most remote areas of US 101, and SR 299 and possibly 36 and 96. I've never made any effort at all to chase them down, but from their antennas - and some vague 453/458 Mhz FCC licenses - I have wondered if they weren't there. Or perhaps on one or more of the existing 800 pairs.
In my 24 years (yikes) up here, I've heard exactly one radio call from CHP that referred to someone using one of these boxes. That was about two weeks ago where some local resident had been attacked by somebody and went to a call box on 101 about 5 miles north of Orick to report it. It turned out to be "not as reported," which I didn't care about. What was important to me was that it finally confirmed for me that the boxes do work.
In my 24 years (yikes) up here, I've heard exactly one radio call from CHP that referred to someone using one of these boxes. That was about two weeks ago where some local resident had been attacked by somebody and went to a call box on 101 about 5 miles north of Orick to report it. It turned out to be "not as reported," which I didn't care about. What was important to me was that it finally confirmed for me that the boxes do work.
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So what you're probably seeing are some crossband repeaters for Caltrans. What they've been doing up here in the 'real' norcal is place highway-level repeaters in strategic spots that can see the most of the road (without being mountain top) and then use UHF 450Mhz to link back to a real radio site somewhere. This fills in all those dead spots the mountain tops can't fill. Caltrans units stay on 800 and get shipped back to the main radio site via 400, then back to dispatch by whatever the site is fed from, wireline, microwave or direct. When the application goes through and you see lat/lon, look some up and you'll see them on roadsides.
This does not match up with the fact, or so we assume, that Caltrans District 1 was going to stay on 47 MHz. A couple of these coordination requests were for District 2 so this answer makes sense when the location is within that district, but some of the coordination requests were in the southerly portions of District 1 where this answer is not consistent with the continued use of VHF Low.
Got it. I know Dist 2 is hybrid lo-band/800 and they coexist pretty easily. I saw Trinity Co in the subject line and figured topic was further north. I know of a couple spots in Trinity along Hwy36 with these 800<->450 roadside remote bases. My 4yr old threw up near one because daddy was enjoying the road too much.
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