Calgary Police Service puts

Canada’s first Public Safety

LTE Network to the test

Superintendent Guy Slater

Overview

1. Calgary Police Service (CPS) introduction

2. CPS current mobile communications

3. Public Safety Broadband Network (PSBN)

4. PSBN proof of concept

5. What we learned

6. What’s next

CPS Technology Vision

Leverage technology to create operational

efficiencies allowing our members to focus more

effectively on community concerns and crime

issues.

CPS Overview

• CPS has roughly 2,200 sworn officers and 500 civilian staff

• Operations in 8 districts via roughly 450 vehicles as well as foot patrol,

motorcycles, mountain bikes, horses and aircraft

• District offices and large facilities linked back to Westwinds HQ via City

fiber

• Smaller satellite locations are connected via mixed leased facilities

– DSL

– Cable Modem

– Wireless Modem

• Motorola Astro 25 LMR system

– 8 tower sites

– 6,500 subscribers

– Serves most Calgary PS users

• Mobile Broadband− 2,500 Blackberrys

− Small mix of IOS and Droids

− ~450 in-car cellular devices

− Also tablets, aircard enabled laptops

CPS – Mobile Communications

• CPS today uses Carrier (Telus) based LTE for:

– Mobile, non LMR voice communications

– Mobile data from cars for CAD/RMS and enterprise data

– Mobile data from tablets and laptops for access to enterprise data

– Video backhaul from security and surveillance cameras

– Remote office connectivity

• CPS operates close to 4,000 total mobile devices, some of

which can now be considered mission critical

• The City of Calgary corporation in total operates close to

15,000 mobile devices

• Have negotiated with Telus to reduce costs where possible,

but remains a large OPEX budget

• No method of prioritization for Public Safety (PS)

CPS – Mobile Communications

• Large scale events have resulted in unfavourable impacts

to carrier communications networks

– Calgary Stampede and Parade

– 2014 Enmax Vault Fire

– 2013 Flood

• Trend towards mobile

– More capabilities delivered to officers while mobile

– Increasingly critical to have wide area communications for command

and control

– Reduces reliance on office infrastructure

– Increases reliance on Telecom/Network services

– Availability is crucial

• The need for a secure, high availability platform

increasingly becomes more important

Public Safety Broadband

• CPS has been very engaged in the discussion of PS

Broadband including:

– Engaging with the National 700 Broadband initiative to ensure that

PS-LTE would be available as an option to address mobile needs into

the future

– Participating through CITIG and CACP to further PS-LTE discussions

– Extensive conversations with Innovation, Science and Economic

Development Canada (Industry Canada) officials to allow for the

licensing to be made available for the purposes of a technology trial

– Engagement with The City of Calgary to discuss options for large

scale, mobile broadband requirements moving forward

• CPS and City IT Exec generally agree that PS-LTE needs to

be considered as a municipal-wide solution

Public Safety Broadband

• Expected benefits of PS-LTE:

– Greater reliability = Safer community

– Self reliant: No shared spectrum or infrastructure w/commercial users!

– Planned system downtime: No UNPLANNED upgrade outages

– Controlled site environments: Ability to harden sites for disaster

scenarios to PS standards as well as high security needs

– Increased technical capabilities & performance

• System control: Ability to pre-empt users and prioritize users

• Peak performance: Throughput/Latency improvements w/out commercial

users

• Coverage: Coverage where City needs it, not where carriers want it

• Extension of City LAN: Increased security and local application

performance

Proof of Concept Genesis

• Motorola approached CPS regarding a limited-term Public

Safety Broadband network trial in 2014 in an effort to allow

client-based operational capability testing

• After much discussion, an agreement was signed in March

2014 for a partnership with Motorola for a 1-year Proof of

Concept Public Safety LTE system

– Spectrum issued as developmental licence

– 700 MHz Band class 14, 10+10 MHz

• Design and construction of the network began in April 2014

• Sites were operational by May 2015

• CPS is the first police service in Canada to actively test a

Public Safety Broadband Network (PSBN)

Purpose of Calgary PSBN Proof of Concept

• For CPS to evaluate a private and secure PSBN in the City of

Calgary on the 700MHz public safety spectrum which can be

used as a national showcase for public safety applications.

• For CPS to evaluate the complexity and resources required to

design, commission and operate a PSBN and allow us to

determine what a future operational model may look like.

• Additionally, the test will be used to determine if PSBN provides

any benefits or capabilities not currently available on the

commercial LTE services in use today.

• The PSBN network will enable powerful and innovative solutions

for first responders. With the network, the CPS can validate the

operations by giving users real-time access to information that

will provide enhanced situational awareness.

PSBN Proof of Concept Evaluation Criteria

1. Costs between commercial cellular provider costs vs.

private LTE network

2. PSBN technical metrics such as data upload and

download speeds, benchmark and under load,

geographical loading and coverage, network capacity, and

determination of bottlenecks

3. Installation challenges into vehicles, such as power drain,

space and configuration, and equipment integration

4. Impact of use for users/workforce – is PSBN transparent

and does it add any capabilities?

5. Ability to integrate existing CPS applications into PSBN

PSBN Proof of Concept Evaluation Criteria

• Features still to be evaluated:

1. Mobile RAN/Core systems (deployables)

2. Compare to LA-RICS and Harris County (USA) results

3. Dynamic priority and bandwidth management

4. Roaming to other systems – commercial and PSBN

5. Testing compatibility with other subscriber equipment

System Overview

• Motorola supplies and

operates:

– LTE Evolved Packet

Core (EPC)

– 7 eNodeB RAN site

– 100 subscriber

devices

– Installations,

commissioning,

management and all

required equipment

• CPS provides facilities

to support the radio

sites and core

(including physical

space, power and

backhaul)

EPC (Core) in Calgary

Motorola Solutions

Managed Services

Canada core

Capacity for all

Category 1, 2, 3 Users

in Canada

First of two planned

cores, providing

Canada Geographic

redundancy

eNodeB Ericsson RBS6201

2x2 MIMO

Macro eNodeB

RF Components

3 sector, high gain

Site Selection

Use of The City’s established infrastructure (police stations, fire

halls, fiber etc.) means that a great deal of the opex cost of the

infrastructure is covered by Calgary with little incremental cost.

Motorola LTE Sites

Dark Green – upload coverage from subscriber device

Light Green – download coverage from subscriber device

VML750 – Vehicular Modem

Specifications

• B14/B13/BC4 LTE

• B0/1 CDMA support

• Local WiFi Access Point

and router

• Client capabilities for real-

time file uploads

• Trunk mounted operation

• MIL SPEC rugged

• Improved reach with vehicle

mounted antennas

• Internal GPS support

Car Installs

Devices have been installed

in patrol cars, vans, sport

utility vehicles (SUVs) and

pickup trucks, as well as

mobile command vehicles

and helicopters.

Applications

Now• Video

• Surveillance

• In-car streaming

• CAD/Records/email

• Crime scene

• Group messaging &

mapping

• Broadband PTT (Non-Mission

Critical)

Future• Integration with LMR

• RTOC

• Body camera

• Replace commercial carrier

• Mission Critical PTT

Virtual Policing

• Virtual beat cop – remote monitoring of high

crime areas

• Surveillance systems supporting covert

operations

• Intersection cameras

Plans for Integration of Data Capture Devices

• Situational awareness supporting officer

safety

– In-Vehicle Cameras

– Robotics

– Drones

– Body Worn Cameras

Eventual System Users

• CPS has been successfully sharing the LMR system with other Calgary

agencies for years, with a strong governance system in place

– Fire, Airport, Bylaw, ENMAX (city-owned utility)

– Now in process of adding Transit and Public Works

• With appropriate city governance and implementation of dynamic quality

of service, priority/preemption, CPS supports other non-consumer users

on the PSBN system

– Fire

– EMS

– Transit

– Electrical Utility (ENMAX – remote metering and control systems)

• The addition of these agencies

– Increases the subscriber quantity to an economically viable level

– Provide valuable network resources by providing physical sites and

backhaul for RAN

– CPS does not support consumers use on this network

Learnings So Far

• CPS has gathered some learnings to this point of the proof

of concept:

– The equipment (both EPC and RAN) requires a level of power

infrastructure that was more than we were ready for and quite a bit

of augmentation was required.

– Network backhaul via fiber greatly reduced the complexity of having

to deal with carriers and provides essentially unlimited bandwidth to

the RANs.

– In Calgary, a much more laborious permitting process is required if

antenna structures will be more than 15 metres higher than the

roofline of the building they are mounted on. Therefore, the site

design was made to allow for mounting heights accordingly.

– Permitting, even to CPS as an internal City department, took

far longer than we expected.

Learnings So Far

• Managing the site commissioning was very resource intensive, even

though Motorola performed most of the work. CPS resources had to

coordinate access and provide escort into secure areas, as well

delivery and storage of all equipment required.

• CPS resources were drawn from Telecoms, Network Services, Fleet,

Facilities, Finance and Police Operations to complete the work.

Although detailed records of the number of hours were not kept, it

wasn’t insignificant.

• Installation of the modems into the cars required multiple antenna

mounts and took up more real estate within the car – always a

challenge. In the utopian future state, replacing LMR and cell carrier

equipment with only PS-LTE would be of great benefit.

• Due to the non-operational nature of this network, getting full

cooperation from operational units proved challenging until a

dedicated sworn member was brought onto the project team.

Next Steps

• Extension of existing proof of concept

• Evaluation of proof of concept

• Coverage expansion

• CPS will be working towards an RFP to procure a

city-wide PSBN

• Leveraging core to other agencies nationwide

Summary

• Trusted partnership with Motorola

• CPS starting to form closer relationships with aligned PS Agencies

across the country to advance PSBN discussions both locally and

nationally

• CPS is comfortable with the technology and capabilities PSBN adds to

law enforcement – it’s capable of providing very high quality, high

volume data connectivity that is adaptable to the needs of PS

• Implementation of the PSBN networks is much more than just a

technical challenge – it involves significant logistical and procedural

hurdles as well

• The business case to proceed with full scale implementation is a

challenge that needs full cooperation of agency partners to successfully

gain approval to proceed

• Management of the PSBN systems needs to be closely examined

in order to find the right fit for agencies

Thank You