Carriers Disagree on Allowing Broadband in Public Safety’s Narrowband Spectrum
There is “an overwhelming consensus” among those that filed comments at the FCC that the commission should not repurpose public safety narrowband spectrum to allow for broadband use, AT&T said in reply comments. Motorola agreed with AT&T. But T-Mobile and Sprint Nextel said changing the rules to give public safety the option of using the spectrum for broadband should not cause the problems cited by many commenters.
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Allowing broadband in the band poses interference, cost and interoperability issues for public safety, AT&T said. “These problems are significant and not reasonably resolved in the short term.” The carrier cited comments by state and local governments and their associations opposed to a rule change. The carrier also responded to earlier comments by Sprint and T-Mobile. The two are wrong that “allowing for the flexible use of the public safety narrowband spectrum is more efficient,” AT&T said. “In fact, it would be less efficient because of the significant risk of interference to both narrowband and broadband services and the need to protect against that potential, such as by creating internal guard bands."
Public safety needs state-of-the-art broadband, Motorola said. But “almost all commenters emphasize that this goal should not be achieved at the expense of mission critical narrowband voice services,” the company said. “The record clearly shows that allowing broadband operations over 700 MHz narrowband spectrum would harm narrowband interoperability and potentially foreclose the possibility of nationwide narrowband interoperability altogether."
T-Mobile responded that most complaints “are premised on a mandatory migration of narrowband spectrum to broadband” that no one is proposing. Public safety narrowband communications remains critical, the carrier said. “However, a flexible approach, managed by public safety, for public safety, will create a path to broadband use of the narrowband spectrum in the future without requiring that use today.” T-Mobile said 960 narrowband channels -- each 6.25 kHz wide -- between 769 MHz and 775 MHz are designated for base-station operations. A revised band plan would allow for adequate guard bands in the spectrum while allowing for more of the 700 MHz spectrum to be used for broadband, the carrier said.
Many initial comments “were based on inaccurate or worst case assumptions regarding how such flexibility might operate in practice,” Sprint said. “Properly implemented, flexible spectrum use will not create interference, constrain the use of narrowband operations by other jurisdictions, or unduly diminish interoperability for 700 MHz public safety spectrum users.”