Railroad Association Says It’s Well Qualified to Be Certified Frequency Coordinator
The Association of American Railroads (AAR) told the FCC in reply comments it’s “well qualified” to be a certified frequency coordinator for Business/Industrial Land Transportation (B/ILT Pool) frequencies in the 806-824/851-869 MHz and 896-901/935-940 MHz bands. In May, the Wireless Bureau sought comment on AAR and National Frequency Coordination (NFC) requests to be frequency coordinators (http://bit.ly/1lvJEXa). Replies were due Monday in docket 14-75. The NFC application met with resistance from public safety groups.
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The AAR is a “representative of the railroad industry” and a licensee in the 800/900 MHz bands, AAR said. It “has substantial experience providing frequency coordination for frequencies below 512 MHz,” the group said (http://bit.ly/TM2LpB). “Throughout the nearly 20 years it has been coordinating land mobile applications, it has not been the subject of significant complaints or an inquiry by the Commission for improper or incorrect coordination practices.”
The FCC did not post replies from NFC by our deadline and an NFC official did not respond to our request for comment. Its request was opposed by the Utilities Telecom Council and other filers. NFC has not demonstrated its “its representativeness, its overall coordination plan (including how recommendations would be made and equality of applicant treatment), its experience coordinating frequencies in the service or technical expertise, and its nationwide coordination capability,” UTC said (http://bit.ly/1qfCGvs).
The National Public Safety Telecommunications Council also opposed NFC’s request, saying NFC “does not appear to be representative of the land mobile user base for which it seeks to be certified as a coordinator” (http://bit.ly/1jGcZ1B). APCO said in initial comments that NFC is “clearly unqualified to be a certified frequency coordinator, especially to the extent that NFC may desire to coordinate Public Safety Pool channels” (http://bit.ly/1iRocBz).