Possible Tunnel System in Hampton Roads?

[Larry51]

I picked up a weak voice signal on 853.4875 last week. I searched the FCC listings through Radio Reference and found a low power system of repeaters and mobiles that I wasn't familiar with. The call signs associated with the system are WQOB581, WQOB582 and WQOB583. The transmitter sites are located at the various tunnels in the Hampton Roads area, including the CBBT. The licenses are issued to the Virginia State Police.

Can anyone help me figure this out?

 

[trumpetman]

That's the first time I've seen that frequency licensed for repeater use (at least around the Carolinas). I've always seen that referred to as the Motorola simplex channel. It used to be programmed into 800 MHz business radios for use when out of range of trunked systems.

 

[Larry51]

That's interesting. Throughout the rest of Virginia, outside of Hampton Roads, it appears to be licensed to Nextel as a cell phone freq.

 

[Jim41]

I picked up a weak voice signal on 853.4875 last week. I searched the FCC listings through Radio Reference and found a low power system of repeaters and mobiles that I wasn't familiar with. The call signs associated with the system are WQOB581, WQOB582 and WQOB583. The transmitter sites are located at the various tunnels in the Hampton Roads area, including the CBBT. The licenses are issued to the Virginia State Police.

Can anyone help me figure this out?

It is part of the STARS system. It is intended to let units communicate when they are inside the tunnel. Some localities are also given access to this capability.

Jim41

 

[Larry51]

Thanks, Jim. That makes sense.

 

[Webodisk]

853.4875 is Norfolks Simplex channel and also a multi use channel on the water front in Norfolk, the tunnel channels used to be tunnel a 866.4875, tunnel b 867.9875, Tunnel c 868.4875, with rebanding not sure how they reconfigured them

MIke