Franklin County radio upgrade

[kinerity]

Anybody know about this? We just received 4 portables for our FD since we run MA into Franklin. Here's the email I got yesterday:

We were informed today that Franklin County will be undergoing a radio refresh that will essentially make all Washington County mobile and portable radio assets inoperable on their frequencies, effective tomorrow morning sometime after 09:00 hrs. Unfortunately, there is not sufficient time to physically touch all the radio assets in the County (or even partial assets) to bridge this communication interruption.

What we have in place as a temporary bridge will be the following protocols;
Option A:

• When a unit is responding “INTO” Franklin County, the Washington County ECC will direct your unit(s) to either Tac 5 Ops or Tac 6 Ops with instructions to move to the talk group and standby for Franklin. Franklin will be completing the set-up of a patch through their ECC back to the Franklin County operating channel. This should create a functional workaround until W.C. Communications Maintenance can work with the private contractor for Franklin County on programming of our radio assets.
  • When a patch is in place, all Washington County radio assets will function on Tac 5 Ops or Tac 6 Ops as assigned.
  • Franklin County will also be providing 3 Franklin County portable radios to each fire station (Sta.’s 4, 13, 27, 9, 7) and 1 portable for 75-9 and 1 portable for Sta. 79 to aid in operations on smaller incidents.
    • This will not provide enough Franklin County portables for firefighters working on larger incidents, so you will need to work within the patch as described above for these incidents.

Option B:

• When a Franklin County unit responds “INTO” Washington County they will move to our operating channel as in past (Tac 1 ops, PS1, etc..) as their operating changes have already been incorporated earlier in the process.

Option C:

• If the above options fail, you will be instructed to go to one of the National interop frequencies (refer to IN2 Zone). From there, a patch will be set up through our Motor-Bridge Network. This historically has worked fairly well, however it does not always produce the audio quality we would expect from the direct patching outlined in Option A above.

Now is the time to grab your radios and scroll through the zones to identify the National Interop Frequencies and familiarize yourself with accessing those frequencies (refer to “IN2 Zone” in your radio). Communications Managers from both Counties are working on a programming schedule for Washington County units moving forward. I am not sure when those details will be brought forward, however I have requested to be kept in the loop on progress. Our apologies for the last minute brief, however we (DES) just learned of tomorrows planned implementation around 12:00 hrs. today. Please keep us posted if you encounter problems with communications under this plan.

 

[Gilligan]

Considering the high numerical range of the new talkgroups, it kind of looks like they are preparing to join a larger statewide system like PA STARNet, but that's just a guess.

 

[jeffm77]

Anybody know about this? We just received 4 portables for our FD since we run MA into Franklin. Here's the email I got yesterday:

What does Washington county have to do with Franklin county? They are several counties apart.

 

[jonwienke]

Washington County MD is adjacent to Franklin County PA.

 

[jeffm77]

Washington County MD is adjacent to Franklin County PA.

Oh ok. Never thought of that. Was thinking Washington county in PA.

 

[jonwienke]

They're on opposite sides of the state line along I-81.

 

[u2brent]

County: Franklin-Adams-Dauphin regional 911 system could save millions

Regional 911 system would make better use of computer resources in Adams, Dauphin and Franklin counties.

www.publicopiniononline.com

Maybe consolidating with

Adams County Public Safety Trunking System, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

Adams County Public Safety Trunking System Profile

www.radioreference.com

The new TG's on

Franklin County Trunking System, Various, Pennsylvania

Franklin County Trunking System Profile

www.radioreference.com

would fit into a larger system merged/joined together

 

[maus92]

I am astonished that this change is literally happening overnight.

 

[Gilligan]

This was provided today as a database submission but has yet to be worked into the database:

"Today Franklin County merged their trunked system with Dauphin and Adams. The regional system is known as SCI Net for South Central Interoperability Network. The System ID for the regional system is 1E8 and the WACN is BEE00. Franklin's sites are now numbered 31 and 32 decimal. The cutover started at 1000 today and is still in process in Franklin County. Dauphin and Adams counties were regionalized prior to today's date, and are operating as normal. Franklin's sites are operating at a reduced capacity until the cutover process is complete."

 

[maus92]

I noticed in the RRDB that the site numbers and SydID for Franklin County haven't been changed (yet.) Will site numbers for Dauphin County be changing?

 

[BigLebowski]

If anyone runs pro96com on the franklin system post-update I would be interested in seeing the tower.txt file.

 

[BM82557]

If anyone runs pro96com on the franklin system post-update I would be interested in seeing the tower.txt file.

I am on the road for awhile, if someone else doesn't have a chance I will try to take a look this weekend.

 

[maus92]

There does seem to be a pattern in the TG madness. The second decimal digit in a TG *might* correspond to a county:
Dauphin = "1" eg. 21001 (Fire Dispatch)
Franklin = "3" eg. 23001 (Fire Dispatch)
Adams = "0" eg. 20000 (Fire Dispatch)

The first decimal digital designates service:

Police = "1" eg. 11001 (Dauphin Police Dispatch)
Fire = "2" eg. 23001 (Franklin Fire Dispatch)
EMS = "3" eg. 30004 (Adams EMS Talk)

 

[hiddenrun]

I am interested to hear what TG are showing up. I have a customer that confirmed the 1/31 site

 

[BM82557]

For Franklin Site 1.31 I'm showing NAC 1E0 -
For Franklin Site 1.32 I'm showing NAC 1E0 with a neighbor of system 1E8 site 1.1 cc 866.8125

 

[maus92]

For Franklin Site 1.31 I'm showing NAC 1E0 -
For Franklin Site 1.32 I'm showing NAC 1E0 with a neighbor of system 1E8 site 1.1 cc 866.8125

I’m currently on the road, but I review my data when I get home in a few hours. The RRDB editors should consider combining the individual county RRDB entries into one system, because that’s essentially what it is now.

 

[BM82557]

I am interested to hear what TG are showing up. I have a customer that confirmed the 1/31 site

As of 21:31 local on site 1.31 I've had -

; South Central PA Interop Network

P25, BEE00.1E8, 13001, 50, Normal, 124, 2019/12/13 21:14, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 13031, 50, Normal, 68, 2019/12/13 21:20, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 13053, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 13054, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 13055, 50, Normal, 11, 2019/12/13 21:20, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23001, 50, Normal, 137, 2019/12/13 21:17, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23002, 50, Normal, 52, 2019/12/13 21:21, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23003, 50, Normal, 59, 2019/12/13 21:07, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23005, 50, Normal, 21, 2019/12/13 21:21, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23006, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23007, 50, Normal, 2, 2019/12/13 20:57, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23016, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23021, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23033, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23037, 50, Normal, 10, 2019/12/13 21:11, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 23040, 50, Normal, 2, 2019/12/13 19:50, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 33031, 50, Normal, 50, 2019/12/13 21:17, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 33032, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""
P25, BEE00.1E8, 53009, 50, Normal, 0, 0000/00/00 0:00, ""

 

[hiddenrun]

We programmed the Unication G5 with the new settings and are monitoring successfully.

SYSTEM ID 1E8
WACN BEE00

Simulcast site:
RFSS 1 (1)
Site 31 (1F)

495.0125a

495.250a

495.450a

495.600c

Mount Quirak
RFSS 1 (1)
Site 32 (20)

494.9375a

495.200a

495.4625a

495.8625c

Using all the new TGs 23001 and up

 

[BM82557]

For Franklin Site 1.31 I'm showing NAC 1E0 -
For Franklin Site 1.32 I'm showing NAC 1E0 with a neighbor of system 1E8 site 1.1 cc 866.8125

That's something different isn't it? I wasn't sure I was getting a decode yesterday so watching it awhile today. BTW the BSI is WQMC384-

 

[maus92]

I had Adams County mapped into Unitrunker 2 previously, so when programmed the (now old) Franklin County system control channels, it gets combined with the Adams County data. This is expected behavior because those systems are now combined into one logical system. I expect the same will happen if I monitor the Dauphin County site. The RRDB should combine these 3 county system into a new entry for the new "SCI Net for South Central Interoperability Network" (or maybe something a bit shorter.)

The Franklin County sites are not referencing each other as neighbors / peers atm as of last night.

Franklin County sites are using NAC 1E0; Adams County sites use 1E1.