My Letter to The NY Sun Editor
Subject: New Channel 16? You Guys Need More Info
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 00:42:15 -0400
From: "Charles J. Hargrove" <n2nov@n2nov.net>
To:
editor@nysun.com
I was sent a link to Jill Gardiner's article on the "new" radio system called
Channel 16. This has been something in conversations since the mid-1990's
and not a post-9/11 idea with recent FCC approval.
Channel 16 refers to the frequency band of 482-488Mhz which makes up the
range for UHF television channel 16. In large metropolitan areas since 1980,
the FCC has allowed use of UHF TV channels 14-20 (470-512Mhz) as a supplement
for various land/mobile services like police, fire, ems, taxis, road crews
and various businesses. Of course, a local UHF television broadcaster on a
particular channel would negate the use of those frequencies in a locale.
The NYPD was already shifting from VHF (151-160Mhz) channels to the UHF
channels (470-480Mhz) in the early 1980's. The increased need for NYPD
dispatch channels was recognized by the early 1990's and some of the "new"
channel 16 frequencies were used starting in 1997. Talks were already
underway prior to the Y2K planning to have a trunked radio system on some of
these frequencies to take the load off of the DOITT 800 trunked system by
some of the more critical agencies. This would allow these agency members to
carry only one radio for UHF instead of a separate radio for VHF, UHF and the
800Mhz systems. This also means that the plans were in the works for FDNY to
abandon their current VHF channels and move up to UHF. Motorola even sold
FDNY on the idea of a UHF digital radio, which failed miserably in March 2001.
These were switched back to analog on the same frequencies and were being
tested by EMS during the summer of 2001. The success of the tests would have
lead to them being reissued to FDNY that October. Unfortunately, 9/11
happened first.
It's sad to see that the money trail and frightened egos of politicians or
bureaucrats determine what we do to support our first responders need for
proper communications. Many expensive and still fragile systems are rolled
out around the nation in a post-9/11 world. We still see them failing
when they are stressed by Mother Nature or ill formed communications plans.
More seems to be entrusted to expensive hardware and software than what
could be simply achieved by proper application of wetware (human gray matter).
