United Cabs in New Orleans?

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JamesPrine

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Hello!

Anyone have the frequency information for radio channels A and B for United Cabs on Polymnia Street in New Orleans? I know they are extremely busy on the VHF frequencies around 152 MHz but cannot pinpoint them with all the other traffic, and they're not listed in the RR database.

Thanks!
 

loumaag

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I'm not sure which set of frequencies are used for what, but here is the license for them.
 

nx_2000

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United Cab uses voice inversion scrambling on their radios so you won't be able to hear them without some sort of descrambler.
 

JamesPrine

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Thanks to everyone for submitting this very interesting information. I have 'cooperative cabs' information in my scanner but did not know they used inversion scrambling, which clears up some questions.

I worked part-time for United briefly about 15 years ago, when I was a full-time police officer in New Orleans, and was always amazed and amused by the incredible high-speed dispatching by the United people. They did not use scrambling then, and their frequencies were even listed in the old Police Call database from RS.

Thanks again everyone!
 

n5ims

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It's common for taxies and towing services to use some form of encryption and/or split frequency operations (dispatch uses one freq while the cabs use another to talk back to dispatch). This is to help prevent other companies from monitoring their transmissions and beating them to the location to "steal" the fare. Encryption also helps when they had to call in a customer's credit card # for authorization.
 

JamesPrine

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It's common for taxies and towing services to use some form of encryption and/or split frequency operations (dispatch uses one freq while the cabs use another to talk back to dispatch). This is to help prevent other companies from monitoring their transmissions and beating them to the location to "steal" the fare. Encryption also helps when they had to call in a customer's credit card # for authorization.

Funny, when I worked for United, we had just the two dispatch channels and no encryption. We didn't call in credit cards, either, we had swipe machines, and were forbidden to possess cell phones in the cabs. But, like I said, that was a few years back.

I do know that the Taxicab Bureau goes after cabbies 'jumping' calls vigorously, and that most savvy New Orleanians refuse to take cabs from other companies, particularly if they called United. Lots of people have United accounts, too. So, it doesn't make too much sense for encryption, unless there are other factors present.

It is widely said in New Orleans that if the police have a problem, they call SWAT. If SWAT has a problem they can't handle, THEY call United Cabs! LOL
 
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