Verizon Wireless Proposes Nationwide Public-Safety Network

Filed in archive Mobile on September 6, 2006

Thanks to Torsten for this one -- RCR Wireless News' Heather Forsgren Weaver and Jeffrey Silva report today that Verizon Wireless is pitching a plan to build a nationwide broadband public-safety network in the 700 MHz band.

"The Verizon Wireless plan envisions using 12 of the 24 megahertz set aside for public safety to build a nationwide public-safety broadband network," Weaver and Silva write.

"Verizon Wireless would augment its existing infrastructure as necessary to give public-safety the coverage it needs and then would extract rent from public-safety agencies across the country to use that infrastructure."

Weaver and Silva point out that the Verizon Wireless plan is "strikingly similar" to one recently proposed by Cyren Call Communications, which has asked Congress and the FCC to set aside 30 megahertz of spectrum in the upper 700 MHz band for a public-safety network.

"The Cyren Call plan would allocate two 15-megahertz chunks -- spectrum currently scheduled to be auctioned -- on either side of [the] 24-megahertz public-safety allocation for its public-private partnership," Weaver and Silva write. "Rather than use the 30 megahertz of spectrum Congress wants auctioned, the Verizon Wireless plan would focus on the 24 megahertz already allocated to public safety."