Hartford Fire

[n1chu]

It’s certainly been asked before, but not covered, or if it has been, where? It’s just curious that they didn’t do as New Britain FD did on CLMRN.

 

[MarkB513]

You know what's funny (although I get why), you can always hear New Britain FD on the H system (I hear them all day daily in Bloomfield), but Hartford FD is likely heard on New Britain's by affiliation.

 

[Firebuff66]

It’s certainly been asked before, but not covered, or if it has been, where? It’s just curious that they didn’t do as New Britain FD did on CLMRN.

New Britain and Stamford already had a P25 systems on the air all they did was kept their systems and went on the state core. Hartford has a EDACS system so its not the same, Maybe they could use the ISSI and roam on the state system like Waterbury, Wallingford & Middletown do, I'm not sure if a old EDACS system can do that

 

[n1chu]

I was aware New Britain had 800 MHz frequencies on their trunked system before CLMRN was here. That new trunked system allowed me to approach New Britain Fire and ask them to release their hold on at least one old VHF High Band frequency for half the FD repeater pair in Farmington.

But is it a condition of joining CLMRN? Do you need to supply frequencies? Its my understanding any town can join CLMRN. But they can’t use existing CLMRN frequencies?

I had not considered NB brought their own frequencies when they joined CLMRN. If that’s the case, sorry for the confusion. My question compared what I thought HFD should have done with new 800 MHz equipment using CLMRN frequencies and numerous TG’s for both FD & PD. Does the state expect new add-on’s to supply frequency assignments from the FCC in order to join CLMRN?

 

[MFCJR]

Not all of New Britain Fire comes over the Hartford Simulcast site. I had one scanner set on the New Britain site and one on the Hartford Simulcast site. I was missing talk on the Hartford site that I was hearing on New Britain's. But you would never know it unless you monitor both.

 

[cg]

Cities with the volume of traffic that Hartford and New Britain have would overwhelm the system if they were to be added without any contribution of frequencies. The State provides fiber/microwave backbone, the P25 core, and wider area coverage. Any improvements to the system that benefit that community are paid for by the community. So Bloomfield added the Troop H Simulcast site at the PD in Bloomfield center. The State added the one at the North end of Bloomfield as it covers a wider area and doesn't benefit primarily Bloomfield. The upcoming Hartland site will provide coverage for the Northeastern end of Troop B's area when it goes online next year.
The system isn't static, there are always ways to improve and optimize it.

chris

 

[n1chu]

Thanks for the insight. I don’t wish to elaborate too much, as I stated, my question is only borne out of curiosity.

I missed that important condition… namely “If your agency wants to join the CLMRN backbone, you must bring your own frequencies to the party.” That explains why Hartford didn’t do what New Britain did… although, with the amount of frequencies currently used by CLMRN, I wonder about the thought Hartford or New Britain would overwhelm the system solely due to lack of frequencies if they didn’t bring along their own 700-800 MHz frequencies. And doesn’t CLMRN have the ability to use a same frequency at multiple sites? I guess I am questioning the size of the cache currently enjoyed by CLMRN. But they had to start somewhere… and I’m guessing it was with only those 800 MHz which the state had allocated at that time… and as additional needs were realized, the cache grew.

 

[nhfdcadet]

Cities with the volume of traffic that Hartford and New Britain have would overwhelm the system if they were to be added without any contribution of frequencies. The State provides fiber/microwave backbone, the P25 core, and wider area coverage. Any improvements to the system that benefit that community are paid for by the community. So Bloomfield added the Troop H Simulcast site at the PD in Bloomfield center. The State added the one at the North end of Bloomfield as it covers a wider area and doesn't benefit primarily Bloomfield. The upcoming Hartland site will provide coverage for the Northeastern end of Troop B's area when it goes online next year.
The system isn't static, there are always ways to improve and optimize it.

chris

I personally am VERY excited to see the coverage change after that Hartland site comes online.

They seem to be putting in more Astro Site Repeaters to fill in coverage gaps too, I see they just added one in watertown

 

[cg]

There are algorithms that are used to predict the number of slots needed in a system. Most smaller agencies could be absorbed without needing additional capacity but when you talk about a busy agency like those found in the cities, that is a lot more volume. I would guess that HFD added 60,000 PTTs per month (without the fireground traffic).
Folks that monitor the various systems listening only to one or two agencies may not realize the volume of traffic that a full system may have. CLMRN had 7.5 million push-to-talks with 600,000 minutes of talk time in June. Considering the size of the State, that is a fair bit of traffic for one month.
I remember watching Hartford's EDACS system running on monitoring software (ETrunk and then Unitrunker), and being amazed that they could regularly be having a dozen channels busy. Non emergency services keep it busy during the weekdays and FD and PD loaded it up many nights.

chris

 

[cg]

FYI, Hartford FD is now broadcasting Dispatch on 154.3100 as well as the Fireground traffic. I suspect that since they are on 2 separate systems (trunked dispatch, conventional FG) that the priority feature for Dispatch will not be present.

Thank you to those who worked to make it happen, whoever you may be.

chris