Prince George Co. fully automated dispatch system

[W4UVV]

1. FYI a county VFD member friend last week told me Prince George Co. was converting to a fully automated dispatch system. During the past few months I noticed in addition to a human voice VFD/EMS dispatch subsequently was an automated synthesized voice dispatch. Maybe totally automated dispatch now means Police, EMS and VFD. Earlier this morning a page and automatic voice announcement reminded personnel of training today for use of the automated dispatch system. I'm not exactly sure what the end result will be, but something will change within the next few days.

2. Why the new Prince George Co. BOS, in my opinion, wasted money on this interim dispatch effort now with radio system replacement actions underway since last Thanksgiving to replace the present crappy uhf county analog radio repeater "system" in 2017 makes no common or economic sense to me.

John
W4UVV

 

[BoxAlarm187]

It's a common misconception that this is a radio system. It's not. It's a third-party computer system that is used for dispatching of fire/EMS calls, not law enforcement. It's compatible with the existing radio system along with the future replacement/upgraded radio systems.

This is the same system that Richmond has used for a few years and Henrico is in the process of installing now. It's a product of US Digital Designs. It's advantage is faster station alerting than humans can do, and notification of different stations of different calls at the exact same time.

 

[LeSueurC]

Virginia Beach uses it too. It works well in larger cities as it frees up a dispatcher, then the FD dispatcher can give the notes

 

[BoxAlarm187]

It keeps the fire dispatcher from having to announce the calls, but there's a still a dispatcher dedicated to monitor the dispatch channel in case of system failure or other anomaly that Samantha can't handle.

 

[W4UVV]

Tnx all. From a monitoring perspective based on the posts nothing will change except the initial dispatcher's voice may be absent. The county has been using this technological service for approximately the past 4-6 months for VFD and EMS calls.

John
W4UVV