Boulder, CO Area Trunked Systems

I recently found myself with some spare time and a rental car in the northwest part of Denver. I decided to cruise up and see what I could find active in the federal bands.

There are a more than a few federal facilities in the Denver area, and in the Boulder area, the Department of Commerce has multiple facilities for NOAA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

I came across at least 3 VHF and UHF trunked sites that may be related to NIST and Department of Commerce agencies in the area. The first was a P-25 VHF trunked system using the System ID of AD5, and here are the details:

System ID             : AD5
WACN                  : BEE07
Tower Number (Decimal): 2-1
Tower Number (Hex)    : T0201
Control Capabilities  : Data,Voice,Registration
Timestamp             : Sat Oct 19 09:36:45 2013

-Tables
#Format: Table ID,Base Freq,Spacing,Input Offset,Assumed/Confirmed,BandWidth,Slots
00,162.00000,0.01250,-6.97500,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
01,162.00000,0.01250,-8.77500,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
02,162.00000,0.01250,-1.06250,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
03,162.00000,0.01250,-8.80000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
04,162.00000,0.01250,-4.60000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
05,162.00000,0.01250,-5.68750,"Confirmed",0.01250,1

-Frequencies
#Format: Channel,Usage,Frequency(/Slot),Input Channel,Input Frequency(/Slot),Input Explicit(1/0),Hit Count
"01-0807","c",172.08750,"01-0807",163.31250,0,0

-Neighbors
#Format: TowerID,TowerIDHex,System ID,Channel,Frequency,Tower Name
202,"T0202",ad5,"03-0808",172.10000

System ID             : AD5
WACN                  : BEE07
Tower Number (Decimal): 2-2
Tower Number (Hex)    : T0202
Control Capabilities  : Data,Voice,Registration
Timestamp             : Sat Oct 19 09:38:13 2013

-Tables
#Format: Table ID,Base Freq,Spacing,Input Offset,Assumed/Confirmed,BandWidth,Slots
00,162.00000,0.01250,-6.97500,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
01,162.00000,0.01250,-8.77500,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
02,162.00000,0.01250,-1.06250,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
03,162.00000,0.01250,-8.80000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
04,162.00000,0.01250,-4.60000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
05,162.00000,0.01250,-5.68750,"Confirmed",0.01250,1

-Frequencies
#Format: Channel,Usage,Frequency(/Slot),Input Channel,Input Frequency(/Slot),Input Explicit(1/0),Hit Count
"03-0808","c",172.10000,"03-0808",163.30000,0,0

-Neighbors
#Format: TowerID,TowerIDHex,System ID,Channel,Frequency,Tower Name
201,"T0201",ad5,"01-0807",172.08750

As you can see from the above PRO96COM files, there are two VHF sites that show each other as neighbors. I could copy both from the Boulder area. In addition to these two VHF sites, there was a UHF site using the same System ID, but showing no connection to the VHF sites;

System ID             : AD5
WACN                  : BEE07
Tower Number (Decimal): 3-3
Tower Number (Hex)    : T0303
Control Capabilities  : Data,Voice,Registration
Timestamp             : Sat Oct 19 10:50:26 2013

-Tables
#Format: Table ID,Base Freq,Spacing,Input Offset,Assumed/Confirmed,BandWidth,Slots
00,400.00000,0.01250,9.00000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1

-Frequencies
#Format: Channel,Usage,Frequency(/Slot),Input Channel,Input Frequency(/Slot),Input Explicit(1/0),Hit Count
"00-0818","c",410.22500,"00-0818",419.22500

I also found two UHF P-25 trunked sites using the System ID of AD1. Here is that information;

System ID             : AD1
WACN                  : BEE07
Tower Number (Decimal): 4-101
Tower Number (Hex)    : T0465
Control Capabilities  : Voice,Registration,Authentication
Timestamp             : Sat Oct 19 09:41:12 2013

-Tables
#Format: Table ID,Base Freq,Spacing,Input Offset,Assumed/Confirmed,BandWidth,Slots
00,400.00000,0.01250,9.00000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
01,400.00000,0.01250,0.00000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1

-Frequencies
#Format: Channel,Usage,Frequency(/Slot),Input Channel,Input Frequency(/Slot),Input Explicit(1/0),Hit Count
"00-0858","c",410.72500,"00-0858",419.72500,0,0

System ID             : AD1
WACN                  : BEE07
Tower Number (Decimal): 5-100
Tower Number (Hex)    : T0564
Control Capabilities  : Voice,Registration,Authentication
Timestamp             : Sat Oct 19 09:39:12 2013

-Tables
#Format: Table ID,Base Freq,Spacing,Input Offset,Assumed/Confirmed,BandWidth,Slots
00,400.00000,0.01250,0.00000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1
01,400.00000,0.01250,0.00000,"Confirmed",0.01250,1

-Frequencies
#Format: Channel,Usage,Frequency(/Slot),Input Channel,Input Frequency(/Slot),Input Explicit(1/0),Hit Count
"00-0805","c",410.06250,"00-1525",419.06250,1,0

-Neighbors
#Format: TowerID,TowerIDHex,System ID,Channel,Frequency,Tower Name
4101,"T0465",ad1,"00-0858",410.72500

Notice that tower 5100 shows tower 4101 as a neighboring site, but tower 4101 does not show 5100 as a neighbor. (I have been advised that P-25 trunked system programming now allows for non-reciprocal neighbors in trunked systems.)

I am fairly certain that the AD5 VHF systems are being used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric  Administration and their projects in the area, as they submitted a request for bidder information on radio system components using these same VHF frequencies back in 2008,

https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=b9fc10eca8957361d0183329c46dcbaf&tab=core&_cview=0

What relationship the UHF AD5 site has to the VHF sites is unknown. The users of the UHF AD1 system is currently unknown.

Unfortunately, all of these systems were running in idle with no traffic heard. This was a weekend near the end of the federal government shutdown, so I didn't expect too much.

There was some discussion on the Radio Reference forums about some new federal trunked systems being heard in the Boulder, Ft. Collins areas north of Denver, but no one seemed to have any information on them.

Press release on The Spectrum Monitor

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