https://urgentcomm.com/wp-content/themes/ucm_child/assets/images/logo/footer-new-logo.png
  • Home
  • News
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Multimedia
    • Video
    • Podcasts
    • Galleries
    • IWCE’s Video Showcase
    • Product Guides
  • Commentary
    • Back
    • Commentary
    • Urgent Matters
    • View From The Top
    • All Things IWCE
    • Legal Matters
  • Resources
    • Back
    • Resources
    • Webinars
    • White Papers
    • Reprints & Reuse
  • IWCE
    • Back
    • IWCE
    • Conference
    • Special Events
    • Exhibitor Listings
    • Premier Partners
    • Floor Plan
    • Exhibiting Information
    • Register for IWCE
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Terms of Service
    • Privacy Statement
    • Cookie Policy
  • Related Sites
    • Back
    • American City & County
    • IWCE
    • Light Reading
    • IOT World Today
    • Mission Critical Technologies
    • TU-Auto
  • In the field
    • Back
    • In the field
    • Broadband Push-to-X
    • Internet of Things
    • Project 25
    • Public-Safety Broadband/FirstNet
    • Virtual/Augmented Reality
    • Land Mobile Radio
    • Long Term Evolution (LTE)
    • Applications
    • Drones/Robots
    • IoT/Smart X
    • Software
    • Subscriber Devices
    • Video
  • Call Center/Command
    • Back
    • Call Center/Command
    • Artificial Intelligence
    • NG911
    • Alerting Systems
    • Analytics
    • Dispatch/Call-taking
    • Incident Command/Situational Awareness
    • Tracking, Monitoring & Control
  • Network Tech
    • Back
    • Network Tech
    • Interoperability
    • LMR 100
    • LMR 200
    • Backhaul
    • Deployables
    • Power
    • Tower & Site
    • Wireless Networks
    • Coverage/Interference
    • Security
    • System Design
    • System Installation
    • System Operation
    • Test & Measurement
  • Operations
    • Back
    • Operations
    • Critical Infrastructure
    • Enterprise
    • Federal Government/Military
    • Public Safety
    • State & Local Government
    • Training
  • Regulations
    • Back
    • Regulations
    • Narrowbanding
    • T-Band
    • Rebanding
    • TV White Spaces
    • None
    • Funding
    • Policy
    • Regional Coordination
    • Standards
  • Organizations
    • Back
    • Organizations
    • AASHTO
    • APCO
    • DHS
    • DMR Association
    • ETA
    • EWA
    • FCC
    • IWCE
    • NASEMSO
    • NATE
    • NXDN Forum
    • NENA
    • NIST/PSCR
    • NPSTC
    • NTIA/FirstNet
    • P25 TIG
    • TETRA + CCA
    • UTC
Urgent Communications
  • NEWSLETTER
  • Home
  • News
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Video
    • Podcasts
    • Omdia Crit Comms Circle Podcast
    • Galleries
    • IWCE’s Video Showcase
    • Product Guides
  • Commentary
    • Back
    • All Things IWCE
    • Urgent Matters
    • View From The Top
    • Legal Matters
  • Resources
    • Back
    • Webinars
    • White Papers
    • Reprints & Reuse
    • UC eZines
    • Sponsored content
  • IWCE
    • Back
    • Conference
    • Why Attend
    • Exhibitor Listing
    • Floor Plan
    • Exhibiting Information
    • Join the Event Mailing List
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Cookie Policy
    • Terms of Service
    • Privacy Statement
  • Related Sites
    • Back
    • American City & County
    • IWCE
    • Light Reading
    • IOT World Today
    • TU-Auto
  • newsletter
  • In the field
    • Back
    • Internet of Things
    • Broadband Push-to-X
    • Project 25
    • Public-Safety Broadband/FirstNet
    • Virtual/Augmented Reality
    • Land Mobile Radio
    • Long Term Evolution (LTE)
    • Applications
    • Drones/Robots
    • IoT/Smart X
    • Software
    • Subscriber Devices
    • Video
  • Call Center/Command
    • Back
    • Artificial Intelligence
    • NG911
    • Alerting Systems
    • Analytics
    • Dispatch/Call-taking
    • Incident Command/Situational Awareness
    • Tracking, Monitoring & Control
  • Network Tech
    • Back
    • Cybersecurity
    • Interoperability
    • LMR 100
    • LMR 200
    • Backhaul
    • Deployables
    • Power
    • Tower & Site
    • Wireless Networks
    • Coverage/Interference
    • Security
    • System Design
    • System Installation
    • System Operation
    • Test & Measurement
  • Operations
    • Back
    • Critical Infrastructure
    • Enterprise
    • Federal Government/Military
    • Public Safety
    • State & Local Government
    • Training
  • Regulations
    • Back
    • Narrowbanding
    • T-Band
    • Rebanding
    • TV White Spaces
    • None
    • Funding
    • Policy
    • Regional Coordination
    • Standards
  • Organizations
    • Back
    • AASHTO
    • APCO
    • DHS
    • DMR Association
    • ETA
    • EWA
    • FCC
    • IWCE
    • NASEMSO
    • NATE
    • NXDN Forum
    • NENA
    • NIST/PSCR
    • NPSTC
    • NTIA/FirstNet
    • P25 TIG
    • TETRA + CCA
    • UTC
acc.com

Call Center/Command


What on earth is taking so long?

What on earth is taking so long?

That's the question Congress wants answered as Project 25 slogs forward
  • Written by Urgent Communications Administrator
  • 1st December 2005

In a February 1999 editorial, MRT asked why the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials’ Project 25 — the initiative to develop eight open architecture/interoperability standards for land mobile radio — had not achieved its goals after a decade’s worth of work.

“Originally, it was supposed to take 24 months to define the project’s standards and implement them,” the editorial stated. “Here we are in 1999 with no system that actually works. Why not?”

Congress is beginning to ask similar questions — and seems prepared to bare its teeth to get some answers. Fast forward to September 29. In testimony before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Dereck Orr, the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) public-safety communications systems program manager, reported that over the last 15 years, only one of the P25 interfaces — the common air interface (CAI) that deals with handset functionality — has been advanced to a level where it would help satisfy one or both of the standard’s goals.

“The remainder of the interfaces either remains undefined or lacks enough specificity to allow for a common implementation of the interface,” Orr said. “In other words, each manufacturer’s implementation of the interface is different and proprietary, thus resulting in systems that do not meet the interoperability requirements as defined by the steering committee.”

Orr added that during the last two years, NIST — using funds from the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice — has tested a number of the P25 hand-helds whose manufacturers claim meet the current CAI standard. “Using the test procedures called for in the standard, NIST found that none of the available radios met all aspects of the standard,” Orr said.

There are several reasons that explain why the P25 suite of standards has been 16 years in the making — and counting. The first is profit: Project 25 isn’t just about enabling different vendors’ radios to talk to each other; it also is about changing how the land mobile radio (LMR) manufacturing industry does business.

The LMR industry is one where proprietary technology has not only been a fact of life, but a vital selling tool. In choosing between LMR manufacturers A and B, public-safety agencies have had to choose between competing visions of LMR transmission. Having done so, they were committed to that manufacturer’s vision, a restriction that helped LMR vendors of all stripes at upgrade time. Put in consumer electronics’ terms, buying a Sony TV set meant one could watch only Sony-originated signals. If one then switched over to a Panasonic model, access to Sony’s TV stations would be lost for good.

The industry’s proprietary nature flies in contrast to the standard’s interoperability goal. For instance, a M/A-COM P25 portable should be able to talk to a Motorola P25 mobile, and both should be able to talk to an EF-Johnson base station (and vice versa). In such a world, public-safety agencies have a purchasing edge because the equipment they need is available from more than one supplier. Again in TV terms, it wouldn’t matter if you bought a Sony or Panasonic model because both could receive the same signals.

Considering the work that LMR manufacturers have done for the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) TR-8 Engineering Committee on Mobile and Personal Private Radio Standards — the industry/user/government coalition guiding P25 to fruition — it isn’t fair to accuse the manufacturers of trying to sabotage the P25 process. On the other hand, it is unrealistic to expect any business to wholeheartedly embrace a process that effectively destroys a valuable marketing tool. After all, “these manufacturers have shareholders that they have to answer to,” said Craig Jorgenson, APCO’s P25 project director.

The second reason P25 has taken so long to develop is the ambitious scope of its mission, which goes far beyond creating a common air interface for hand-helds. For Project 25 standards to encompass the full range of LMR functions, they must cover mobile radios and consoles in both voice and data modes, plus interconnections to the public network and inter-jurisdictional network connections (wireless or wired).

This doesn’t begin to account for new technologies such as voice over IP, which is why Ron Haraseth, APCO director of automated frequency coordination, views P25 as “an evolving suite of standards that will never be fully complete.”

Changes in radio technology since 1989 also have complicated the P25 process. When the idea of open standards first was proposed, analog radio was the norm. Today, analog is a relic whose time is all but past thanks to digital radio technology. This has created several unanticipated problems for LMR users.

For instance, “when you move from analog to digital transmission, your coverage pattern changes,” Jorgenson said. “Meanwhile, we’ve moved from 25 kHz wide channels to 12.5 kHz and are on our way to 6.25 kHz. Although this change increases channel capacity, it requires substantial redesigns of radio technology.”

As if these challenges weren’t enough, the human factor also has slowed P25’s progress. “Over the years, we’ve had various LMR players coming and going … raising different technical issues that had to be dealt with,” said Paul Cizek, director of systems solutions for Motorola’s radio systems division.

Making matters worse, not all manufacturers have bought into P25. “During the first ten years, we had one of the three major manufacturers object to the concept of the P25 standard,” Jorgenson said, adding that the opposition ended only after the manufacturer changed hands a “number of times,” resulting in new leadership that has taken a positive attitude toward P25.

Add the fact that the P25 standards effort — like any such initiative — is based on consensus between the various competing interests, and one can understand why it has been such a slow-moving process.

This is why Paul May, M/A-COM’s business development manager, isn’t surprised that P25 has taken longer than World War II’s Manhattan Project. “When it came to building the atomic bomb, I think they only had one vendor,” he quipped.

Without a newfound catalyst, it is not inconceivable that the P25 process could continue to drag along at a snail’s pace, perhaps delivering a final report by mid-century. Consequently, the Commerce Committee is trying to speed things up. After listening to Orr and other witnesses, the members imposed deadlines for P25’s completion. Actually, in true Washingtonian fashion, the committee set deadlines for when it will lay down the law should the LMR industry fail to get its act in gear and finish the P25 process on its own.

“We have received direction from Congress that if the P25 committees can’t assure us that they are going to advance the P25 interfaces, we’re going to have to find an alternate solution,” Orr said.

According to Orr, Congress “made it clear” in its fiscal 2005 appropriations that NIST should direct its funds to alternatives to such P25 components as the inter-RF subsystem interface, the fixed station interface and the console interface should corresponding standards fail to be completed within the next 12 to 24 months.

Congress also devised another sanction guaranteed to hit vendors where it hurts.

“The feds have said that, ‘If you [LMR manufacturers] want to keep selling radios to the Department of Defense, they will have to be P25 compliant,’” said M/A-COM’s May.

Given these threats, it is not surprising that “there’s a new sense of urgency in the P25 process,” according to Motorola’s Cizek. It’s an urgency that APCO’s Jorgenson welcomes. “If there’s one thing business understands, it’s money,” he said. “If there’s a threat to their revenue streams, they have to be concerned, and they will act.”

And that might be the bottom line: After years of slow progress, Project 25 appears to be on the fast track. Finally.

Reflections on the P25 process

By intervening as it has, Congress seemingly has motivated the LMR industry to make P25 a reality. However, it should be noted that unexpected technical and engineering issues could crop up to further delay the process. While lawmakers may be able to pressure human executives, they have yet to gain sway over the laws of physics — despite what some senators may think.

Of course, should this congressional threat prove to be effective, one might ask why it wasn’t made years ago? Back in the 1990s, the answer would have been that radio interoperability wasn’t on Washington’s radar screen. Now, in a post-9/11 world, interoperable communications are on everyone’s front burner, particularly in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. This not only has led the legislative and executive branches to take a more active role to improve public-safety radio communications, clearly it has made them far less patient.

This said, seven of the eight Project 25 standards are yet to be completed, so perhaps it’s too early to celebrate. In fact, given the slow, tortuous history of the P25 process, MRT may once again ask, “What on earth is taking so long?” many years down the road.
— James Careless

Tags: Call Center/Command Commentary Print content Project 25

Most Recent


  • FAA approves beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) flights in North Dakota
    The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) avionics company uAvionix received Federal Aviation Administration approval to conduct advanced beyond visual line-of-sight (BVLOS) flights of small UAVs in North Dakota.  The flights will be conducted at the Northern Plains Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Test Site (NPUASTS) in Grand Forks, one of seven FAA-run UAV test sites in the U.S., using […]
  • AT&T wireless growth keyed by FirstNet—now provides 24,000 agencies with 4.4 million connections
    AT&T this week reported that FirstNet ended 2022 supporting more than 24,000 public-safety agencies with “about” 4.4 million connections, including 377,000 connections that were added during the last three months of 2022—a total that represents more than half of the carrier’s post-paid wireless growth for the quarter. AT&T officials released these figures in conjunction with […]
  • Report: Remote work causing offices to empty, but walkable cities still in high demand
    Given the reliance on vehicular transportation in the United States, some American cities historically haven’t prioritized being walkable in past planning and or design. But amid an unprecedented shift in the economy toward remote work, those that have are increasingly desirable for prospective residents. A new report from Smart Growth American and Places Platform, “Foot Traffic Ahead […]
  • AT&T FirstNet unleashes robotic dogs for emergency services
    AT&T is releasing robotic hounds from Ghost Robotics as part of the service provider’s FirstNet emergency responder service. In a blog, AT&T VP Lance Spencer explained that the robotic dogs will be connected to AT&T’s network and deployed for public safety, defense, federal and state agencies, local police and fire departments, and commercial customers. “Network-connected robotic dogs can deliver a […]

Leave a comment Cancel reply

To leave a comment login with your Urgent Comms account:

Log in with your Urgent Comms account

Or alternatively provide your name, email address below:

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Content

  • What on earth is taking so long?
    Newscan: Feds recover millions from pipeline ransom hackers, hint at U.S. Internet tactic
  • Cyber is the new Cold War, and AI is the arms race
  • Private wireless networks in the US start going public
  • Microsoft patches 6 zero-day vulnerabilities under active attack

Commentary


How 5G is making cities safer, smarter, and more efficient

26th January 2023

3GPP moves Release 18 freeze date to March 2024

18th January 2023

Do smart cities make safer cities?

  • 1
6th January 2023
view all

Events


UC Ezines


IWCE 2019 Wrap Up

13th May 2019
view all

Twitter


UrgentComm

FAA approves beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) flights in North Dakota dlvr.it/ShgxHW

30th January 2023
UrgentComm

AT&T boasts of core ‘white box’ success in 5G, fiber push dlvr.it/Shgb4w

30th January 2023
UrgentComm

Spending American Rescue Plan Act funds: A primer for municipalities dlvr.it/ShgZ52

30th January 2023
UrgentComm

AT&T wireless growth keyed by FirstNet—now provides 24,000 agencies with 4.4 million connections dlvr.it/ShY5qH

27th January 2023
UrgentComm

Report: Remote work causing offices to empty, but walkable cities still in high demand dlvr.it/ShXM7Z

27th January 2023
UrgentComm

AT&T FirstNet unleashes robotic dogs for emergency services dlvr.it/ShW7p8

27th January 2023
UrgentComm

Federal agencies infested by cyberattackers via legit remote-management systems dlvr.it/ShVhn3

26th January 2023
UrgentComm

How 5G is making cities safer, smarter, and more efficient dlvr.it/ShVS1h

26th January 2023

Newsletter

Sign up for UrgentComm’s newsletters to receive regular news and information updates about Communications and Technology.

Expert Commentary

Learn from experts about the latest technology in automation, machine-learning, big data and cybersecurity.

Business Media

Find the latest videos and media from the market leaders.

Media Kit and Advertising

Want to reach our digital and print audiences? Learn more here.

DISCOVER MORE FROM INFORMA TECH

  • American City & County
  • IWCE
  • Light Reading
  • IOT World Today
  • Mission Critical Technologies
  • TU-Auto

WORKING WITH US

  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Events
  • Careers

FOLLOW Urgent Comms ON SOCIAL

  • Privacy
  • CCPA: “Do Not Sell My Data”
  • Cookie Policy
  • Terms
Copyright © 2023 Informa PLC. Informa PLC is registered in England and Wales with company number 8860726 whose registered and Head office is 5 Howick Place, London, SW1P 1WG.