A federal appeals court on Friday upheld the requirement that Sprint Nextel vacate some of their wireless channels adjoining public safety channels.
Sprint, the nation’s third-largest wireless carrier, must clear certain channels by June 26, the appeals court ruled. The company is swapping spectrum with the public safety agencies to eliminate radio interference
The deadline was set three years ago in an initial order. But last September the FCC told Sprint it must clear out regardless of whether public safety agencies are ready to move in. Sprint took the case to the appeals court — and lost today.
“The commission’s decision to hold Nextel to the June 26, 2008 deadline is reasonable,” the appeal court opinion said. “If Nextel completely vacates its channels on June 26, there is reason to believe it will immediately reduce interference experienced by public safety licensees.”
Sprint’s statement said the FCC’s position was “unreasonable”. Sprint claims to have spent more than $1 billion in its spectrum relocation efforts so far, and said if regulators enforce the deadline, it would cripple their Nextel service.
Sprint is disappointed with the court’s decision. Sprint has been and continues to be committed to working with public safety to eliminate the risk of interference for public-safety communications. However, more than 500 public-safety agencies have requested more time — in many cases, years — to complete their retuning activities.Sprint has agreed to provide spectrum to public-safety licensees within 60 days of when they are ready to retune.
We remain hopeful that we will be able to resolve this issue in a manner that balances the 800 MHz reconfiguration with the needs of our customers — especially the 3 million public-safety customers who rely on our iDEN network.
The FCC had two problems it wanted to solve with the spectrum swap;
- A developing interference problem stemming from the FCC’s own decision to allow Nextel to offer cellular like services using frequencies interleaved with dedicated police and fire channels.
- A requirement to add 90 Mhz of spectrum for “3G” services (the AWS band).
The FCC solution required three steps:
- Move television truck “live” microwave frequencies to a nearby band – that would make room for Nextel, AWS and Mobile Satellite Services.
- Put Nextel’s cellular frequencies in that (now) open slot at 1.9 GHz
- Give Nextel’s interfering frequencies (now abandoned) back to public service users and consolidate their 800 MHz frequencies in one block.
For television news crews, the analog 2 GHz system couldn’t handle HD from mobile vans. Now – thanks to Sprint’s new digital microwave gear – the latest bloody shooting can be “live in HD”.
Nextel’s original 800 MHz “dispatch” service provided “push to talk” service with only a few towers in each community. But when new Nextel “cellular” towers went up, they sometimes drown out first responders using hand-held radios near a Nextel tower. Nextel, unlike other cellular operators, used a frequency interleaved with public service radios. That caused interference as new towers went up.
The Consensus Decision moved Nextel out of the Police band and into their own spectrum. Nextel agreed to pay for the costs incurred by both public service agencies and local broadcasters to get new radios and shift to new frequencies.
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Related (and sometimes dated) DailyWireless articles include; Sprint-Nextel: Deal from Hell, Sprint Forces Forsee Out, FCC: Nextel Gets PCS Spectrum, Public Service Moves to 800Mhz, Public Safety Shuffle, Decision in Nextel’s Court, Consensus Plan from FCC?, Localizing Consensus Plans, Verizon Jaming Public Service Fix, FCC: Nextel Gets Spectrum Credit, FCC: Nextel Gets PCS Spectrum, Nextel’s Consensus Move, Nextel Accepts Consensus Swap, Freq Consensus?, 700MHZ Goes Live, General Dynamics Wins IWN Contract, McCain Wants Commercial 700 MHz for Police, and FCC: Moving on 700MHZ Public Safety Interop?New York’s $1B Wireless Net, Oregon’s $500 Million Statewide Wireless Network and FCC: Limited Open Access, No Wholesale Requirement for 700 MHz.
