Trig
Member
A place to discuss the new Johnson County Kansas P25 radio system.
Johnson County P25 System
- Thread starter Trig
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Trig
Member
I agree... I am involved with a group that is currently building the talk groups and working on the plan to transition. Look for the system to get active starting next month as "non-mission critical" agencies start transitioning to the new system. Looks like most Fire, Law Enforcement, and EMS will transition the second quarter if 2010... most likely in June..
Early estimates as of now are that the system will have hundreds of talk groups... possibly over 1000! I saw a uncompleted fleet map a few weeks ago, and it still had some more agencies to add to it!
I know i have talked to several folks that are interested in the happenings with this system, and wasn't sure if this would be a good place to discuss!?!
I too have only heard testing on the system. I know that i am placing the order for all of my agencies new radio equipment next week... installing around May, and switching from VHF to P25 probably in June!
Early estimates as of now are that the system will have hundreds of talk groups... possibly over 1000! I saw a uncompleted fleet map a few weeks ago, and it still had some more agencies to add to it!
I know i have talked to several folks that are interested in the happenings with this system, and wasn't sure if this would be a good place to discuss!?!
I too have only heard testing on the system. I know that i am placing the order for all of my agencies new radio equipment next week... installing around May, and switching from VHF to P25 probably in June!
Thanks for the info Trig!
Absolutely. I think this is the best place to get a discussion going. As far as the talkgroups go, JOCO did have a list of the "propsed" talkgroups published at Johnson County Radio Project. It was in spreadsheet format, however, it looks like that link has disappeared. I have those programmed in the scanner and ready to go, but wouldn't be surprised if there are changes and additions.
Based on what I saw on that spreadsheet, it looks most of the traffic will be in the clear and unencrypted. Do you know if that's still the game plan?
Also, for those who are interested, JOCO has made the full Motorola Contract available on their site: http://radio.jocogov.org/documents/Contract as Filed.pdf. Haven't read the whole thing, but there should be a wealth of good information there!
Absolutely. I think this is the best place to get a discussion going. As far as the talkgroups go, JOCO did have a list of the "propsed" talkgroups published at Johnson County Radio Project. It was in spreadsheet format, however, it looks like that link has disappeared. I have those programmed in the scanner and ready to go, but wouldn't be surprised if there are changes and additions.
Based on what I saw on that spreadsheet, it looks most of the traffic will be in the clear and unencrypted. Do you know if that's still the game plan?
Also, for those who are interested, JOCO has made the full Motorola Contract available on their site: http://radio.jocogov.org/documents/Contract as Filed.pdf. Haven't read the whole thing, but there should be a wealth of good information there!
Trig
Member
The discussions i have been involved in sound to be that law enforcement will have a few talk groups that will have encryption, however system wide will be non-encrypted. These talk groups will be for special operations and will not be used for routine radio traffic. Of course i will post if i hear any thing different. My group meets again next Thursday, and hopefully i will have more to share at that point!
I haven't had time to read this yet, but does anyone know what they are going to do about fire paging etc?
Although it doesn't provide a specific answer to your question, this document goes over a few of the options JOCO is considering with regards to fire station alerting:
http://radio.jocogov.org/documents/Station Alerting in a P25 Trunking World.pdf
My guess is they'll have different talkgroups set aside for each fire station, and they will send some sort of alert tone out when dispatching calls (similar to what KCKS/KCMO currently does). Apparently two tone paging is not an option with P25 trunked systems.
Shawnee County has been using tone / voice paging with its 800 TRS successfully for years. It is true that you can not initiate personal pagers on a TRS (P-25 system or not), but there is nothing from stopping them from running a VHF or UHF paging system that muli-casts with the TRS (like Shawnee County).
Topeka Fire stations use a Zetron station alerting system over the Shawnee TRS. The paid-call / volunteer fire departments all operate off the TRS, but have tone/voice pagers which alert over a VHF transmit only paging system. AMR multicasts its dispatch traffic on 800 and UHF, along with tone/voice alerting.
Trig
Member
Fire paging has been an interesting discussion. Currently paging takes place on the VHF system, but running along side that is a system called Locution. This is a alerting system that runs over computers in each firehouse, and is a computerized voice dispatch. The computer mutes all radio traffic in the station and broadcast the call information over the stations PA system. This solves the alerting issues for those units that are in quarter, but provides no means of alert for units that are out of the station or, the bigger issue, those departments that still have volunteers!
It sounds like the ECC, who is the dispatch for fire and ems in the county, will maintain the current dispatch VHF channel as a broadcast only channel for toning and voicing calls. Probably very similar to Shawnee county. There has been no real discussion as to any new toning and voicing procedures for the P25 system and how that will work with the VHF side of things. I think that the operations people at the ECC have been waiting for the transition plan to be approved before they start discussion with the fire people how it will work. I look for those discussions to happen soon.
It sounds like the ECC, who is the dispatch for fire and ems in the county, will maintain the current dispatch VHF channel as a broadcast only channel for toning and voicing calls. Probably very similar to Shawnee county. There has been no real discussion as to any new toning and voicing procedures for the P25 system and how that will work with the VHF side of things. I think that the operations people at the ECC have been waiting for the transition plan to be approved before they start discussion with the fire people how it will work. I look for those discussions to happen soon.
Trig
Member
Well... JoCo transit is on the system and sounds good. In the next week a few other agencies will transition as well... Airport Commission is one and then a few others will switch too. Public safety is still looking at June of this year.
MadSpleen85
Member
Subscribed to this thread. Defiantly let us know when dates start getting set. I have a digital setup picked out. Looking to purchase by mid-May at the latest unless something changes and more agencies make the switch sooner.
Trig
Member
Here is the fresh information from this mornings meeting!!! The "Go-Live" date for Fire and EMS units in June 15th. JoCo Sheriff South Zone will probably go before Fire/EMS in June. No exact date was discussed. South Zone effects all Sheriff patrol units, civil, warrants, and DPU along with cities of Spring Hill, Gardner, Lake Quivira, Park Police, Edgerton and Desoto. As i type the Airport Commission is installing their equipment and will be on the system in the next 2 days. Wastewater to follow. No other agencies have stated when they will transition.
I am still in the hunt for a RR data base administrotor to help me get this long list of talkgroups i have into the data base.... I agree with KCoax on same talkgroup id's... but i have several for those agencies that have not been on the system before... if you can help me out PM me!!!
The managers of the system are very pleased with the system thus far. This has been a project that has spanned several years... i know i have spent the last 2 years with this group and we still have alot of work to do!!!
I am still in the hunt for a RR data base administrotor to help me get this long list of talkgroups i have into the data base.... I agree with KCoax on same talkgroup id's... but i have several for those agencies that have not been on the system before... if you can help me out PM me!!!
The managers of the system are very pleased with the system thus far. This has been a project that has spanned several years... i know i have spent the last 2 years with this group and we still have alot of work to do!!!
I'll see if Lindsay will allow me to admin this area while we get everything kicked over so I can lend a helping hand if nothing else.
MadSpleen85
Member
My new RS Pro-106 arrived this morning. The JO sounds great on digital. Very clear even on the rubber duck.
rtfred
Member
I noticed that the new 700 system had about a bazillion talk groups added within the past couple of days. It will be interesting to hear this system go "live" over the next few months.
MadSpleen85
Member
Heard a few tests on the digital Emergency Management groups this afternoon.
bchappuie
Member
My PSR-500 should be delivered tomorrow, and I'm pretty excited to get the new system programmed. Are there any csv files, that can be loaded via AOR software? Just to make life a little easier.
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