I can't remember the last time I've heard them on low band. How long has it been?
GTO_04
800 simplex would be perfect for flaggers. They could use one of the ITAC channels in direct mode or the statewide talkaround channel (855.2375 PL 192.8). The only time I have ever heard that channel used was by several police officers working what I think was a local football game. Couldn't have been too far away from me because I was hearing it on my 2096 with just the 800 MHz rubber duck.Ever since the flooding, I've heard a lot of DOT-52-SUB traffic on the Bloomington tower. Particularly, I've heard what sounds like flaggers directing traffic. I would have thought simplex would have been better for this, but I guess they don't want to have more than one radio, and 800MHz simplex isn't really used as far as I'm aware (although SAFE-T does have some simplex frequencies)
IMO, Indiana will be in a sorry state of affairs when the defecation hits the rotary oscillator and SAFE-T goes down at the same time. Its one thing to have workarounds set up, but its another thing entirely to actually 1)know that they exist, 2) know what they are, and 3) know how to use them. Many users of this system are so addicted to infrastructure, and when it goes down it seems that most of them have no idea what to do.
800 simplex would be perfect for flaggers. They could use one of the ITAC channels in direct mode or the statewide talkaround channel (855.2375 PL 192.8). The only time I have ever heard that channel used was by several police officers working what I think was a local football game. Couldn't have been too far away from me because I was hearing it on my 2096 with just the 800 MHz rubber duck.
It all comes down to lack of education and training. These guys apparently do not understand that they are tying up precious system resources and infrastructure by chit-chatting on their talkgroups or using talkgroups on the system for traffic that could be just as easily passed on conventional simplex - and the radios do have that conventional simplex programming - it's just that nobody knows what it is or how to use it.
IMO, Indiana will be in a sorry state of affairs when the defecation hits the rotary oscillator and SAFE-T goes down at the same time. Its one thing to have workarounds set up, but its another thing entirely to actually 1)know that they exist, 2) know what they are, and 3) know how to use them. Many users of this system are so addicted to infrastructure, and when it goes down it seems that most of them have no idea what to do.
For some agencies, this may be true, but for others, it definitely is not. Many are either voluntarily scrapping their fallback systems (INDOT for example, or ISP pulling out their low band gear as another example) or letting their old systems fall into such states of disrepair that should they have to fall back on those systems, their reliability will be in question.I don't think you give them enough credit, several times SAFET towers have gone down leaving a lot of users to find other ways to communicate and they have always had a backup, and when Martinsville flooded all the PD got was busy signal and they switched over to a backup system for all fire and PD.
David,So now I'm interested in what happens when T1 lines go down.... I assume that a site which is cut off from the rest of the SAFE-T world continues to function, but will not receive simulcasts nor broadcasts from radios affiliated to other sites? What happens if half an agency's radios are affiliated with one tower on the network, and the other half with a tower off the network?
David
David,
When a T1 goes down, the site goes into what's called site trunking, and all radios affiliated with talkgroups on that site lose all communication with radios affiliated to that same talkgroup on other sites still connected to the zone controller (or sites also disconnected from the zone controller). When a site goes into site trunking, wireline consoles in dispatch facilities that are connected via leased line to the zone controller are also unable to use the site in site trunking for any communications, because they have no way to connect with it.
David,
When a T1 goes down, the site goes into what's called site trunking, and all radios affiliated with talkgroups on that site lose all communication with radios affiliated to that same talkgroup on other sites still connected to the zone controller (or sites also disconnected from the zone controller).
Yeah, I guess I forgot about those. Glad you guys were able to understand my post. Something else that may interest everybody is that in a SmartZone system, when sites are connected to the ZC as they normally would be under normal operation, none of the audio is repeated locally at the tower site.Not confusing enough yet..... add in priority levels too....