Public safety transitions into a digital network

By Debra Friedman
Greenwich Time Staff Writer
Posted: 01/01/2009 01:00:00 AM EST

Heading into the new year, the town's public safety departments are preparing to make the switch from a dated analog radio system to an all digital network, providing better coverage and quality for police, fire and GEMS workers who rely heavily on the network.

So far the town has upgraded nearly 300 portable radios, which now have digital and analog capabilities, though officials are still operating them on the old analog network.

Over the next eight weeks, new digital Motorola mobile radios will be installed in police cars, fire trucks and GEMS vehicles, according to Lt. Mark Kordick, who oversees the police department's information technology operations and is managing the digital conversion project.

"We just received the new radio equipment and we are now organizing the installation," said Kordick. The installations are being done by a private company, Northeastern Communications. Once all the radios are installed, Kordick said communications officials will literally flip a switch to begin operating on the new digital network. Officials are hoping the upgrade, which was approved by the town in 2005 as part of a $5.5 million five year improvement plan for the town's radio system, happens by March.

"It should be fairly seamless to our subscribers," said Kordick.

However, the switch has been made more complicated in light of a separate rebanding project which is aimed at moving the towns radio frequency to a lower level on the 800-megahertz spectrum to avoid interference with the Sprint Nextel services.

The rebanding project comes through an agreement between the town and Sprint Nextel, which funded nearly $600,000 to replace another 300 mobile radios which are installed in town public safety vehicles.

"There is a benefit to the municipality to replace the radios that are already 10 years old and in need or replacement anyway," said Kordick, who noted that the rebanding project did slow down the conversion to a digital network.

"It's a giant administrative headache but it did provide a pretty significant fiscal benefit because we were intending to replace all of the public safety mobile radios and now we only have to pay for the digital upgrade."

Once the rebanding is finished and the digital network is set up, public safety officials said the new network will provide significant benefits to emergency personnel who rely heavily on a static-free network to communicate with one another especially during serious incidents such as accidents or flooding.

"It's going to enhance the capabilities because right now there are certain areas of town where it is very difficult to get out an analog signal especially on portables, which causes some problems with our operations," said Deputy Fire Chief Tom Nixon.

"For a firefighter, the radios your lifeline so anytime you can enhance the capability you are just making it safer for them."

Kordick said the digital system will also allow for better encryption.

"One of the problems with old analog encryption is it badly distorts the audio quality. We don't have that problem with digital encryption. There is virtually no difference in voice quality," said Kordick.

Overall, Kordick said the new system will increase the efficiency of the network for public safety officials which will allow for better inter-agency communication and thus a better response when emergencies happen.

"Public safety uses about 50 percent of the gross radio traffic in town," said Kordick,

"As the radio system continues to grow and more departments have more use for it, the fact that we can digitize will be very beneficial."