Verizon Wireless Battles Nextel → 800 Mhz Public service screwed up BEFORE Nextel

The 800 Mhz digital radio systems in use today were more than well screwed up before Nextel got big. When Chester County PA began it's migration to a 800 Mhz system produced by EF Johnson back in the late 90's, most of the police officers refused to carry the portables, as they were known for unreliability. Being a dispatcher there I got to experience first hand the drawbacks of the system. Later, as a PO working in that same county, I too, refused to carry a 800 Mhz portable without one of the old 500Mhz portables along side it. Something as simple as standing next to a pine tree (pine trees are known to block UHF signals), or being in a parking garage would put you out of range.

Delaware's 800 Mhz digital system is also a mess. This system, produced by Motorola, is so full of holes that 2 years ago 2 firefighters were almost killed when they didn't receive an evacuation order in a burning building on their portables. The state claims the problem has been fixed, but it still has lots of holes.

In contrast, when the FCC ordered most public service dispatch centers to migrate to 800 Mhz, Delaware County, PA did not. Delco still uses the old 500 Mhz system, and it is one of the most reliable in the surrounding area. From what I understand, they have no intentions of migrating.

The FCC wanted to move the public services to the 800 Mhz digital radios so it would have more spectrum to sell off in the analog 500 Mhz these uses vacated. This was the FCC's mistake. Their is no need for digital radios in public service communications. Digital radios are an "all or nothing" proposition. Either you make the repeater, or you don't. With analog radios, if you can key the repeater, you may get static, but if the dispatcher hears even a portion of the transmission, it's better than the low pitched tone the digital portable moans out when it's out of range.

This problem is, in part, the fault of the FCC, and as long as Nextel is complying with the conditions of their grant, they have limited liability. Given the fact that Nextel is a very popular service among first responders, it makes sense for them to offer up a solution that is mutually beneficial. Could you imagine the backlash if Nextel told the FCC and the entire emergency community to cram it? In turn, they want some consideration. I have no problem with that.

Bottom line, they could move all of public service back to 500 Mhz analog radios, and I have no doubt you would hear a big fat hooray from the emergency services crowd.

to swap out all that customer equipment when Nextel moves off the 800 band? All our phones will become paperweights. Boost Mobile and Southern Company also use the 800 band iDEN network too.

True, 800mhz public service radios have their many flaws and were around LONG BEFORE Nextel even existed, so they're not to blame (except maybe the popularity of their service). Funny, AMW had a story on this VERY problem!

Do not forget one thing: during the big blackout in NE, not long ago, NEXTEL PTT - was the only service working. Verizon had only limited service. The architecture of the NEXTEL PTT network, is much better than any other copycat, like Verizon, Sprint...etc. The only thing that Verizon was doing lately, was bitching about it, but not improving anything in their network. As in regards with the emergency system, unfortunately this is no surprise. In US, each county comes up with their own ideas, and use of equipment. In Europe they have Tetra- a unified system, Fire, ambulance, and police that works all over EU, and having designed emergency re-routing, in case one branch of the network fails. US still has to do a lot of catch up on this matter.

Sorry, but NEXTEL had big problems in the NYC area during the blackout, almost no service at all. The other carriers, although spotty, faired much better. As a member of NYC's DoITT Emergency Response Group I was involved in many conference calls which include all major telecom companies in the NYC area and believe me everybody knew about NEXTEL's problems.

Lets clear up the PS band and give Nextel the 1.9 band.
But before Verizon starts crying foul they should remember how much of the spectrum the cellular industry got for free in the 80's and early 90's.
I personally don't think the FCC gives a damn who gets what and what it interferes with they just want the multi-billion sale.

said by Irun Man:

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to swap out all that customer equipment when Nextel moves off the 800 band? All our phones will become paperweights. Boost Mobile and Southern Company also use the 800 band iDEN network too.

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Boost uses Nextel's network (and is now 100% owned by Nextel), so anything Nextel does will take care of Boost. The Consensus Plan (backed by Nextel) both leave Nextel with some ESMR spectrum so that current handsets won't become paperweights; I haven't looked closely at the alternatives VZW and others have come up with, but IIRC even they leave Nextel with some 800 spectrum, just not as much.

IMO, SoCo's SoLINC isn't even in the same league as Nextel -- SoLINC is still high-site (as opposed to cellular/sectorized low-site like Nextel is), has a very different market focus than Nextel does, and has a virtually impeccable record (unlike Nextel) of dealing with interference issues. SoLINC, of course, is *not* supporting the Consensus Plan since they see it as giving a windfall to Nextel and hurting their own business.

-SC

said by VegasMan:

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But before Verizon starts crying foul they should remember how much of the spectrum the cellular industry got for free in the 80's and early 90's.
I personally don't think the FCC gives a damn who gets what and what it interferes with they just want the multi-billion sale.

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IMO, VZW is ticked off at Nextel because VZW's PTT has been a flop. (Even ALLTEL's and Sprint PCS's PTT offerings are better.)

Yes, the FCC does seem quite unconcerned with interference issues these days, and seems more interested in money.

-SC

said by roamer1:

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said by VegasMan:

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But before Verizon starts crying foul they should remember how much of the spectrum the cellular industry got for free in the 80's and early 90's.
I personally don't think the FCC gives a damn who gets what and what it interferes with they just want the multi-billion sale.

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IMO, VZW is ticked off at Nextel because VZW's PTT has been a flop. (Even ALLTEL's and Sprint PCS's PTT offerings are better.)

Yes, the FCC does seem quite unconcerned with interference issues these days, and seems more interested in money.

-SC

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What do you expect powell is bushes little puppet. and we all know that tax cut he made needs to be paid back by some one.
"Hello yeah we are auctioning some spectrum but you can't come to the auction house only your competitor is allowed inside. Have a nice day we had to tell you."

Another fine example of how screwed the fcc is.

My fire station's response area was one of the first to have radio coverage problems independently proven to be caused by Nextel. Just as it's true that in some areas 800 MHz has had problems before Nextel came along, it's also true that 800 worked fine until Nextel came along.

If your 800MHz coverage was such that standing by a tree blocked the signal then that's a system design issue, not a frequency problem. Our Motorola 800MHz SmartZone system works well in a very (pine) forested area.

There would only be a big fat hooray from emergency responders if a new system included trunking capabilities. Our old analog system was so restricted by limited frequencies and heavy traffic that it became nearly unusable.

said by NEXTEL in Blackout:

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Sorry, but NEXTEL had big problems in the NYC area during the blackout, almost no service at all. The other carriers, although spotty, faired much better. As a member of NYC's DoITT Emergency Response Group I was involved in many conference calls which include all major telecom companies in the NYC area and believe me everybody knew about NEXTEL's problems.

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I have to disagree. I has a Voicestream phone and a Nextel on me that day. My Nextel connected via PTT 9 out of 10 times. In fact after that I got my wife a Nextel because the PTT was better on that day. Tossed my voicestream phone. But Nextel has to work on pricing and customer service A LOT! But they are getting there slowly.