Around the 2005ish time frame the late Ted Moran started a discussion on the CARMA (Chicago Area Radio Monitoring Association) email list where he would post a town in Cook County in alphabetical order and whatever scanner info he had on that town. Others were then asked to add their own info on that town. He posted a couple towns each day. He got a great response!
He and I started to compile the results and we soon expanded this to the collar counties. I started to then save the info into a listing sorted by county then community. We debated whether to make this into a database or a profile format. We tried both ways and found it easier to present it in a profile. We followed a similar format to that of the Scanner Master Illinois Communications Guide (SMICG) that I had edited a decade before. We had many updates for a possible Second Edition that sadly never came about. Kevin O’Rourke in particular provided hundreds of updates to the SMICG that were incorporated into the Profiles.
I started to edit these on a county-by-county basis and then did separate Profiles for other items of interest like StarCom21, State Police, large central dispatch centers and airports. Over the next year or two I had compiled all the info I could find from the FCC databases, CARMA emails and excursions until I had all 102 counties, all controlled and uncontrolled airports and the railroads all well documented. After all was said and done we had almost 150 Profiles posted, one for each of the 102 counties, and others for the specialty items.
We posted these to the CARMA website as they were completed and encouraged readers to submit any updates. I kept a folder for these updates and processed them as time allowed. I would process all this in MS Word then export the final document to a PDF before uploading it.
While these were extremely popular eventually, we decided to point our energies toward a more widespread audience by making the info available to RadioReference. I was made a Database Editor for Illinois and between myself, Terry Weatherford, Kevin O’Rourke and others we were able to update much of the Illinois section of the RadioReference database to the point that it made the CARMA Profiles redundant. In late 2012 we decided to stop updating the Profiles and asked members to submit further updates to RadioReference instead.
Over that 7- or 8-year time frame we were able to consolidate the combined knowledge of many of the CARMA membership into an easy-to-read format. While we never considered RadioReference as a competitor to our efforts, it became clear that it was the superior platform.
We still get requests for copies of the Profiles so I uploaded them to a DropBox folder. I will leave them there for a while but cannot guarantee that they will be there forever as I may need the space later. You can access them at the below link:
www.dropbox.com
He and I started to compile the results and we soon expanded this to the collar counties. I started to then save the info into a listing sorted by county then community. We debated whether to make this into a database or a profile format. We tried both ways and found it easier to present it in a profile. We followed a similar format to that of the Scanner Master Illinois Communications Guide (SMICG) that I had edited a decade before. We had many updates for a possible Second Edition that sadly never came about. Kevin O’Rourke in particular provided hundreds of updates to the SMICG that were incorporated into the Profiles.
I started to edit these on a county-by-county basis and then did separate Profiles for other items of interest like StarCom21, State Police, large central dispatch centers and airports. Over the next year or two I had compiled all the info I could find from the FCC databases, CARMA emails and excursions until I had all 102 counties, all controlled and uncontrolled airports and the railroads all well documented. After all was said and done we had almost 150 Profiles posted, one for each of the 102 counties, and others for the specialty items.
We posted these to the CARMA website as they were completed and encouraged readers to submit any updates. I kept a folder for these updates and processed them as time allowed. I would process all this in MS Word then export the final document to a PDF before uploading it.
While these were extremely popular eventually, we decided to point our energies toward a more widespread audience by making the info available to RadioReference. I was made a Database Editor for Illinois and between myself, Terry Weatherford, Kevin O’Rourke and others we were able to update much of the Illinois section of the RadioReference database to the point that it made the CARMA Profiles redundant. In late 2012 we decided to stop updating the Profiles and asked members to submit further updates to RadioReference instead.
Over that 7- or 8-year time frame we were able to consolidate the combined knowledge of many of the CARMA membership into an easy-to-read format. While we never considered RadioReference as a competitor to our efforts, it became clear that it was the superior platform.
We still get requests for copies of the Profiles so I uploaded them to a DropBox folder. I will leave them there for a while but cannot guarantee that they will be there forever as I may need the space later. You can access them at the below link:
Dropbox
www.dropbox.com
