Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Police Drive Into Next Gen

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 01 Aug 2003 16:38:47 -0400

Police Drive Into Next Gen

Faced with a CDPD phase out, public safety agencies turn to next-generation
networks for their data needs, both in the field and in dispatch centers.
BY BRAD SMITH
AUGUST 1, 2003

If you drive through the east Texas town of Sulphur Springs and get pulled over by
a motorcycle officer, don't be surprised if he whips out his Handspring Treo.
The officer isn't checking his schedule, though. He's checking your license plate.

The Sulphur Springs Police Department is among a growing number of public safety
agencies using 2.5G and 3G networks for voice and data communications.  That's in
part because cellular digital packet data networks, traditionally a wireless
bastion for public safety, are going away.

AT&T Wireless has stopped adding CDPD customers and plans to shut down its network
June 30, 2004, hoping to migrate users to its GPRS network. It's had some success
doing that, but other carriers with packet data networks also are vying for the
business.

Verizon Wireless, which has an extensive CDPD network, plans to pull the plug at
the end of 2005. It is marketing its CDMA2000 1X network as the alternative.
The 30-person Sulphur Springs Police Department has been using the Sprint PCS 1X
network nearly a year now, with Sierra Wireless AirCards in laptops in patrol cars
and the Treo for motorcycle officers.

Robert Stidham, the city's assistant police chief, says a number of vendors over
the years tried to sell him a CDPD data solution. He told them he was interested,
but knowing there was no CDPD coverage in his town 80 miles east of Dallas, he
asked them how they were going to transmit the data. "They'd never call back," he
says. But when he learned that Sprint's 1X network had been turned up last year,
he signed up almost immediately.

"The police department is not in the tower business," he says. "We're a rural
department. I wanted something reliable, fast and practical and that's what I
got."
Nine patrol cars and three motorcycle officers are equipped. They use the laptops
or Treos to access the state and federal crime information center to check on
driver's licenses, license plates, warrants, stolen cars and other property.

The network also is used for "silent" dispatch, allowing a dispatcher to send a
call via text. That eliminates possible errors on voice calls and frees the
dispatcher from call-back questions.

Coming soon is the ability for the officers in the field to type out their reports
and transmit them to the headquarters without having to return in person.
Sprint PCS is getting ready to launch an expanded offering for public safety
agencies, according to Kevin Packingham, director of business marketing. He
declined to get into specifics about the new offering but says it will take
advantage of Sprint PCS' single frequency, support for mobile IP so police cars
don't drop connections when they move between cells, and specialized pricing
plans.

The new product also will take advantage of Sprint PCS' 1X bandwidth, which uses
compression to boost data rates by double or more, Packingham says.
Also in the wings is the capability to do handoffs between the PCS network and a
private 802.11 wireless LAN, which some agencies are using for high-speed
connections at a police station. (See related story on Page 8.)
Another police department on the cutting edge of this kind of technology is the
Mesquite, Texas, Police Department. The agency, located in an east Dallas suburb,
this summer became the first in the country to use a new Sierra Wireless modem,
the MP GPRS 750, on AT&T Wireless' GSM/GPRS network.

The modem also has global positioning system capabilities, which can be used by
the officers in patrol cars and by the dispatchers.

Mesquite has installed 30 units in patrol cars, with another 10 in fire department
vehicles, according to Capt. Robert Piccioni. Ultimately the agency will use 150
of the units, which are mounted in the patrol car trunks along with the computer.
A touch screen is mounted near the dash.

Piccioni says the department started using the system after a 90-day test to make
sure the cars had good coverage in all parts of the city.

"We originally were contracted for CDPD, but we learned it was going away," he
says. "We didn't want to build a technology that was dying."

The system not only gives officers access to the state and national crime
databases, but also to the court system, as well as city and county records such
as tax records. Piccioni likes the GPS mapping applications because dispatchers
know exactly where the cars are located. Patrol cars also can see the location of
the place they are being dispatched, with routing information.

Mesquite also has installed a WLAN at its police stations and city gas pumps.
Using Motorola software, the city's IT department can automatically update the
software and databases in all of the vehicles.

"We don't have to physically touch the computers (in the cars) because we can do
it over the air," Piccioni says. "And the two systems work together; the system
switches from one (air interface) to the other.

Nextel Communications Inc. also is trying to grab some of the former CDPD
business. The carrier has conducted a series of meetings with public safety
agencies to extol its own packet data network and Direct Connect capabilities.

Jason Keck, a Nextel enterprise data solutions engineer in Walnut Creek, Calif.,
says police officers like Direct Connect because it allows them a two-way radio
kind of experience that others can't listen in on using a scanner. He knows of
police agencies that have coordinated raids with Direct Connect and discovered
that the suspects were listening to a police scanner in an attempt to learn the
officers' plans.
Nextel came out with ruggedized modems in June specially designed for use in
police vehicles. They come with or without GPS.

Nextel also works with partners like Aether Systems Inc., which has several
applications designed for use by public safety agencies. Motorola has an
application called Visual APB that allows officers to cut and paste a suspect's
photo from a desktop PC and e-mail it to a Nextel handset.

With all of these alternatives from the various carriers, it doesn't appear public
safety agencies will be left high and dry when CDPD dies a quiet death over the
next few years.
http://www.wirelessweek.com/index.asp?layout=article&articleid=CA314158&spacedesc=Departments&stt=000

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Free shipping on all inkjet cartridge & refill kit orders to US & Canada. Low prices up to 80% off. We have your brand: HP, Epson, Lexmark & more.
http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5510
http://us.click.yahoo.com/GHXcIA/n.WGAA/ySSFAA/61FxlB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/