Tetra triumphs for Tube

FOLLOWING Adamning report on the state of mobile communications for use by emergency services on the London Underground (the Tube), O2 looks likely to be awarded a contract for a Tetra (TErrestrial Trunked Radio) based system.

According to a report in The Business, the police and the other emergency services will award a contract to O2 subsidiary, Airwave, before September. The contract is thought to be worth around £100 million.

Tetra is, of course, a separate European standard for digital 'trunk' or private networks and is designed from the ground up for use by organisations such as the police and fire fighters.

You'd have thought this would mean little delay in getting the system working but the paper says it could be two years before the whole thing is functional. Why not build it around the intended 'mobile enabling' of the Tube using GSM, Mobile Insight can't help wonder?

At one point both Sweden and Norway were seriously considering the option of using CDMA 450 MHz instead of Tetra. As Joe Nordgaard, head of consultancy - Spectral Advantage, put it, “TETRA is very expensive, capacity is limited and it doesn't handle broadband data. You're dealing with a technology that is out of date and expensive to deploy.”

That initiative now seems dead and buried. µ

See Also
Why don't mobile work on the Tube now?
Sweden does amazing volte face over CDMA