Low band radio

[Inspector71]

Any LE agencies still use low band radios ?

[Outpost75]

Not in the last 50 years.

[ST911]

Any LE agencies still use low band radios ?


Not in the last 50 years.

Still seen in limited, localized use, and regional variation. Mostly car to car, but some PSAPs have kept monitoring capability.

[HeavyDuty]

I think ISP finally killed it off in IL when StarCom21 rolled out.

[Outpost75]

Still seen in limited, localized use, and regional variation. Mostly car to car, but some PSAPs have kept monitoring capability.

In Virginia and West Virginia game wardens, foresters and a few highway and volunteer fire departments were still using 39 and 46 Mhz low-band in the 1980s, but the practice pretty well disappeared even in the rural areas with adoption of APCO25 protocol and interoperability standards adopted post 9/11. The last analog radios in my agency went out of use in 2002 and in my mobile command post vehicle were replaced with a Motorola Micom-2 used for both voice data and ALE interoperability with FEMA and military units in the SHARES HF network, and also digital trunking voice on 800 mhz, mobile data and imaging on 470 Mhz. Only conventional channelized analog radio remaining was VHF-Hi band on 154 Mhz. used to communicate with volunteer fire, EMS and ground SAR.

[Wheeler]

In Virginia and West Virginia game wardens, foresters and a few highway and volunteer fire departments were still using 39 and 46 Mhz low-band in the 1980s, but the practice pretty well disappeared even in the rural areas with adoption of APCO25 protocol and interoperability standards adopted post 9/11. The last analog radios in my agency went out of use in 2002 and in my mobile command post vehicle were replaced with a Motorola Micom-2 used for both voice data and ALE interoperability with FEMA and military units in the SHARES HF network, and also digital trunking voice on 800 mhz, mobile data and imaging on 470 Mhz. Only conventional channelized analog radio remaining was VHF-Hi band on 154 Mhz. used to communicate with volunteer fire, EMS and ground SAR.

My local sheriffs office still uses VHF for dispatch. Not all agencies have gone over to the digital, trunk encrypted systems. We are not exactly rural either. We’re considered a suburb of Atlanta.