City of Meriden, CT, USA

The safety of Meriden Police staff was at risk with an aging system that failed to provide sufficient radio coverage in all areas of their jurisdiction. The Police Station is surrounded by hills and situated at the bottom of a trough, which poses a significant coverage challenge. The previous radio system was a single site repeater with multiple satellite receivers. The repeater was located on top of a building which happened to be the lowest point in the city, so could not penetrate the hills to reach the low-lying areas.

The main requirement of a new system was to be P25-compliant, in order to be able to work in with neighboring agencies and connect to the state-wide system. A P25 system would allow Meriden to be compliant with the current standards and, in doing so, have a system that could be upgraded and/or migrated to digital when needed.

Meriden also wanted to improve the coverage for the on-hip portable radio, to assist Officers when they have any problems away from the patrol vehicle. They need assurance that any Officer on the street is able to call headquarters to get help at all times.

With an increase in portable coverage that is predicted, the plan is to bring other emergency services onto the network to improve interoperability throughout the area. In addition, Meriden plans to link the systems to the state-wide network being rolled out in Connecticut, with a wider goal of increasing interoperability between 911 centers.