What is it going to
mean for agencies in Knoxville, TN? Colin Ickes will be our LEPC speaker
this month and will discuss "Narrowbanding".
What is Narrowbanding???
Technically, it’s known as “Re-Farming.” More
commonly, it’s called “Narrowbanding.” Either way, if
you’re involved with public safety odds are you’re going to be familiar with it.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has ordered a change in how most
radios operating on frequencies below 512 MHz work, and since more than 85
percent of public safety agencies use radios that are affected, there is a good
chance your agency will have work to do.
Simply put, the change
requires VHF and UHF radios to use less radio bandwidth (a.k.a. spectrum) thus
leaving the vacated spectrum to form new channels. The FCC has decided to
implement the change in two steps or phases. Under phase 1 your usable bandwidth
will be halved, leaving the other half to create a new channel thus doubling the
amount of channels. In phase 2 it will be halved again resulting in four times
the number of original channels. The channel split won’t be right down the
middle. Instead, one-fourth of the space will be shaved from the upper channel
limit and one-fourth will be shaved from the lower limit. Your original channel
will be left intact but a whole lot “narrower.” Before January 1, 2013, all new
radio equipment will have to meet the phase 1 requirements and user licenses
will have to be modified to reflect the change. No date has been set for phase
2, but typically it would be sometime beyond the expected life (8 years or so)
of equipment purchased in 2012.
It’s important to consider that it’s likely all of your radios,
repeaters, base stations, mobiles, and portables will have to be programmed,
physically altered, or replaced to comply with this change. Although it may
sound easy, the trouble is in the details. Chances are that your entire network
is operating in “wideband” 25 kHz channel spacing. Within the next few years,
you are going to have to narrowband all at once. Yes, every radio on a
particular channel, pretty much all at once. Mixing wideband and narrowband
radios on the same frequency creates a variety of problems, best avoided given
public safety’s mission. Think about it—all of law at once, all of fire, and/or
EMS at once. Not to mention equipment replacements, very busy radio vendors, and
government administrators that want to know what’s happening. FCC license
modifications,
determining existing radio inventory, change execution and
management, funding, testing,
contingency planning, and coverage impacts.