Communicating in noisy and active environments was a key challenge during a test of an LTE public safety network at a rodeo in Houston, said a FirstNet blog post Tuesday. The test was done by Texas and Harris County, one of five “early builder” public safety LTE network projects. FirstNet has a spectrum manager lease agreement with each project to provide early access the public safety spectrum in the 700 MHz band. Public safety officials did the test at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo at NRG Stadium. The March 1-20 event had about 2.48 million visitors, with 75,508 on the most-attended day. Festival noise was a challenge, said Lynn Bashaw, FirstNet director-network operations. “For example, voice communications were severely impacted during the concerts and in the carnival ride areas,” he said. “In addition, when responders are working an incident, they must be able to communicate without holding a device and selecting features. Much work remains to optimize the performance, usability, and reliability of these mobile devices and accessories for use in a noisy and active public safety environment.” For the test, multiple vendors provided more than 90 handheld mobile devices to about 60 users out of about 600 public safety staff, Bashaw said. Public safety used push-to-talk and situational awareness applications, as well as tethering to laptops, he said. Harris County hasn’t finished its Band 14 LTE network for public safety, so the team rolled out a cell on wheels with a 100-foot mast, and installed three Band 14 LTE nodes at key locations around the venue and two low-power nodes for in-building coverage inside the facility hosting the command center, he said.

Considering the amount of time and money it takes to clear spectrum bands, the next White House administration likely won't deviate far from the current spectrum sharing approach, Satellite Industry Association President Tom Stroup said during an FCBA CLE Thursday: "There may be some tweaking, but I don't expect a major shift." Speakers all indicated the questions about spectrum sharing involve its degree and how to implement it, because the question of whether it will happen is settled.

The FCC’s 39-month timetable for the post-TV incentive auction transition is time enough, said Grundy Integration, RIO Steel & Tower and T-Mobile in a meeting at the FCC. The company representatives met with Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake, Gary Epstein, chairman of the Incentive Auction Task Force, and other FCC officials, said a filing in docket 14-252. “Representatives from the tower-climbing companies estimated that the average antenna installation project takes two to four weeks, though they emphasized that there is no typical installation,” the filing said. “A low-elevation, side-mounted, high-frequency antenna installation could be done in as few as five days. An extremely complex, high-elevation, top-mounted, low-frequency antenna installation could take six weeks or more, though the tower climbing experts characterized an installation of this complexity and length as "an outlier.” Both tower companies have the personnel to help complete the transition, they said. Equipment isn't an issue, they said. “RIO operates its own full turnkey tower fabrication facility,” the filing said. “This facility produces pole derricks called gin poles; complete tower structures, such as guyed towers up to 1,500 feet and self-support towers up to 450 feet; and the components necessary for tower modifications and strengthening. RIO can fabricate a gin pole in as little as two weeks once it has the design specifications.” T-Mobile, expected to be a major player in the 600 MHz auction, has said repeatedly that broadcasters should be able to complete the repacking within the 39 months mandated by the FCC and within the $1.75 billion budget established by Congress (see 1602180063). “Until we know how many stations will need to move and to what channels, it remains an exercise in futility to argue that the FCC set precisely the right deadline and that there should be no safety valve whatsoever for stations unable to transition in time,” an NAB spokesman said in response to T-Mobile.

Google wants Globalstar to make public the protocols its network operating system uses to authorize spectrum uses by terrestrial low-power service broadband devices in Wi-Fi channel 14 and demonstrate the NOS can exchange information needed for spectrum use in channel 14 with non-TLPS devices without relying on nonpublic protocols or standards, it said in an FCC ex parte filing posted Friday in docket 13-213. It recapped a conversation between Google Communications Law Director Austin Schlick and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler's aide, Edward Smith, about Globalstar's TLPS plans. Google said any FCC approval of Globalstar's testing of TLPS in currently unlicensed spectrum should require such testing look at options for general public use of channel 14. In a separate ex parte filing Friday, Open Technology Institute and Public Knowledge said again said they could support TLPS use of channel 14, but only if the FCC can guarantee a net benefit to the public, in a meeting with Wireless Bureau Chief Jon Wilkins. The agency should allow reciprocal public use of channel 14 in locations where TLPS isn't deployed and where Globalstar says there's slim risk channel 14 transmissions will interfere with its mobile satellite device customers, said Michael Calabrese, director-Wireless Future Project, OTI, according to the filing. "Globalstar is highly unlikely to deploy immediately on a nationwide basis," OTI and PK said. "In return for the auction-free windfall that Globalstar seeks, unlicensed operations should be able to use Channel 14 on an opportunistic basis, as the Commission has adopted for the 600 MHz band post-incentive auction." Globalstar didn't comment.

The LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition offered its own concerns and said “repacking ‘all’ broadcasters, both those eligible for repacking protection, and those that are not, into a smaller portion of the UHF and VHF bands after the close of the incentive auction, will present unprecedented logistical AND financial challenges to our industry.” The comments came in a letter to the FCC, noting the repacking could start in less than a year. The coalition complained that low-power TV stations and translators will have to move with no compensation. “Our impacts will range from $500 to $900 million at a minimum just to move,” the group said, using an industrywide figure. “The damages over the past four years of regulatory overhang and non-eligibility in the auction have devastated our balance sheets and pocket books, and has ruined many a retirement plan. Our industry is determined not to let that happen to us in any new legislation or rulemaking.” The coalition said it must be “at the table” as transition planning evolves. “Unless our industry is at the table for the transition planning, we will go to court and Congress to intervene,” the group said. “We know our status; we know what the rulemaking says. But for too long the FCC has neglected its obligations to the owners of the spectrum to make sure they are getting the best they can from it.” The letter was filed in docket 12-268.

The TV incentive auction should end up being bigger than the AWS-3 auction, said Preston Padden, former executive director of the Expanding Opportunities for Broadcasters Coalition, in a Wednesday blog post. The AWS-3 auction had only 70 qualified bidders, with pricing driven primarily by four bidders -- AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Dish Network, he said. “Based on detailed auction simulations in the FCC record, the 600 MHz auction is likely to include a net of 90 or 100 MHz of paired spectrum -- twice as much as in AWS 3,” he said. “And, demand is greater in this auction. 104 bidders have filed in the 600 MHz auction -- more than the 70 in AWS 3.” Carriers have tried to downplay the value of the spectrum, Padden said. “But just a few weeks ago, Bill Smith, president of AT&T Network Operations, gave a speech in which he candidly admitted the continuing need for more spectrum,” said Padden (see 1602230042). The 600 MHz spectrum is also uniquely valuable, he said. “It travels long distances and goes through walls. Even advanced 5G systems will need low band spectrum for signaling channels.”

The FCC is looking for an outside contractor to oversee parts of the broadcaster repacking after the TV incentive auction, FCC officials confirm. The agency quietly released a request for solicitations last month. FCC officials said Tuesday numerous groups are focused on repacking, but no changes to the rules are pending, especially with the auction to formally start March 29. Meanwhile, a T-Mobile engineer said in a blog post Tuesday the carrier is more convinced than that the repacking can be completed within the 39 months mandated by the FCC.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler will tout “significant progress in our ongoing efforts to maximize the benefits of communications technology” in the four months since last testifying before the House Communications Subcommittee, according to written testimony for a Tuesday oversight hearing. He will talk about the big-ticket initiatives before the agency, from the pending broadcast TV incentive auction to his proposals to overhaul of set-top box rules, Lifeline and privacy rules for ISPs. All five commissioners will testify. The hearing is scheduled for 10:15 a.m. in 2123 Rayburn.

The 104 names of potential bidders in the TV incentive auction, released by the FCC Friday (see 1603180054), was higher than the number of bidders that qualified for the AWS-3 auction last year. While a positive for the FCC, some auction skeptics haven't been converted to optimists. Several analysts continued to question whether the incentive auction will match the dollars raised by last year’s record-setting AWS-3 auction.

CTIA believes 39 months is enough time for the broadcaster repacking after the TV incentive auction, President Meredith Baker said during a meeting with reporters Wednesday. Baker also said the outlook is unclear on whether the 3.5 GHz shared spectrum band will get strong carrier interest.