First responders want more spectrum for safety network

[Scandxer]

First responders want more spectrum for safety network

Published 22 January 2010

First responders want more spectrum for safety network | Homeland Security News Wire

A 10-MHz swath of spectrum in the 700 MHz band freed up by last year’s switch to digital TV broadcasting already has been set aside for the nationwide network for first responders; public safety officials, though, said the additional bandwidth is necessary to create a robust, high-speed network capable of handling multiple kinds of data, as well as video and voice traffic

 

[NorCalrescue]

I have heard a lot about this 700MHz Public Safety band. Some of what I have read indicates in the future there will be a push for first responders to have 700MHz capability for Nationwide interoperability. Anyone else have any info on this? Time frame? End-user equipment?

 

[DaveNF2G]

Check out Urgent Communications at Urgent Communications magazine online | Formerly MRT magazine and other professional publications. This has been going on for many months already. Even the above posted article, which is already 2 weeks old, was covering an even older story.

 

[NorCalrescue]

Thanks Dave. Good info. Crazy times. I'm trying to prepare our fire department for the next 5+ years of radio communications equipment and it is difficult to predict where things are going since technology is traveling at a rate never seen before. P25, dual-band, 700/800MHz, etc.

 

[N_Jay]

If you want a 5 year plan that means anything to 3 to 5 years you need to talk to a good consultant, or risk having the vendors sell you on their vision. (Which may not be wrong, but may not be right for your agency either)

 

[DPD1]

I'll be very surprised if that happens. That would be an astronomical cost, and honestly... I'm not sure I really get it. At what point would you have a scenario where any one person in the nation needs to talk/pass info, to any one other person in the nation? As far as passing data... Isn't that what the internet and phone is for? Data which would be coming from a centralized source, then passed to other centralized sources. All data has to first be disseminated by the higher people in the command structure anyway. Otherwise you have chaos. I guess it would be nice to have in a perfect world, but everything is kind of broke right now.

 

[N_Jay]

Most of these articles don't do a good job describing the connectivity that is desired nor what is proposed.