GMRS travel channel

[AdmiralCochrane]

Its a good ham board 

[back4more70]

On 5/13/2022 at 8:42 PM, Sshannon said:

I would support the idea if it weren’t for the fact that 10 - 12 million people live far enough north that they are not allowed to use channel 19 because of an agreement with Canada.

Based on my subjective and nerdy calculations, there are a little over 10,000 licensed GMRS users that are affected by this, which works out to about 7% of the United States licensed GMRS users.  I say we (the 93%) use channel 19 anyway hahaha

[Wildzebra]

On 5/17/2022 at 12:15 PM, marcspaz said:

 

Well, I hope my post may help clear things up. I doubt it, but hopefully. 

 

I know I stir the pot with some of my posts about this, but reality is, this is my current and typical daily situation while I'm driving around...

[Picture of Midland radio on Ch 19 - Deleted to reduce space]

I'm probably still go a stir the pot when this topic pops up though. LOL

I'm lucky enough to have dual channel, that said my secondary is on Simple Ch 19 as well.  

Taking over GMRS one licensee at a time

[FreqieRadio]

I always have it on. Still quiet tho 

[WSCN364]

I read through all 3 pages of this thread. 

If i understand it all correctly, Ch 19 is the "Road channel" and Ch 16 is the "off-Road" channel.

Do i have it correct?

In the twin cities area of Minnesota, not finding much of anything whilst scanning. Still have a huge lot to learn about these Radios, I just got my license and went with a Randy recommendation for a beginner radio, Baofeng UV-5G Plus. (Randy is worth listening to, correct?). Being so new I'm still trying to sort the wheat from the chaff.

Jimmy

[WRXB215]

Yes, Randy's videos are very good. As far as "road channels" are concerned, there is nothing "official." There is a lot of history and logic that would suggest certain channels but it really depends on the group you hang out with. You use what works for you and your group or what's common in your area.

[nokones]

A standard for a "Travel Channel" and its history is well documented and established probably way before many people on this forum were born or took up this hobby and that may be the reason why there is this confusion between Channels 19 and 20. 

My position the standard hasn't gone away its still there I just wish that people would honor it.

[Lscott]

4 hours ago, nokones said:

A standard for a "Travel Channel" and its history is well documented and established probably way before many people on this forum was born or took up this hobby and that may be the reason why there is this confusion between Channels 19 and 20. 

My position the standard hasn't gone away its still there I just wish that people would honor it.

Those that push using channel 19 haven't looked at their license I guess. The frequencies for channel 19, simplex and repeater, are prohibited north of "Line A" and East of "Line C". That cuts out a LOT of population centers. That's why it's a dumb idea.

[WSHU859]

WSHU859 Well, while the original post for this topic was in 2022, I believe we should support this action.

I live in a rural area, where the entire county only has cell service on the main roads, and on the PA. Turnpike. 

The other main roads such as 522 virtually has no cell coverage at all. If there is an emergency, such as a vehicle accident, fire, or need police, you actually need to drive about 7 miles for cell coverage. My 50 watt GMRS in my truck is good for over 16 miles in this same dead zone for cellular. The sad part is that the office of emergency management, and or the 911 call center do not monitor CB, GMRS, FRS, or Smoke Signals. I believe we have an opportunity here to both use the GMRS system for better communications between friends, and family, but to greatly help with rural emergency situations. I am actually shocked that the FCC is not promoting this system.  Let's keep pushing chanel 19, and 20 for road use, and start actively talking to 911 centers. Thank you.

[EternalNoob]

Due to an FCC agreement with Canada, channels 19 and 21 cannot be used in the buffer zone between lines A and B, and C and D on this zoomable map: 

https://www.fcc.gov/reports-research/maps/frequency-coordination-canada/

This prevents large swathes of the US from using either of these frequencies. 

 

[SteveShannon]

4 hours ago, EternalNoob said:

Due to an FCC agreement with Canada, channels 19 and 21 cannot be used in the buffer zone between lines A and B, and C and D on this zoomable map: 

https://www.fcc.gov/reports-research/maps/frequency-coordination-canada/

This prevents large swathes of the US from using either of these frequencies. 

 

Some time ago it appears that these prohibitions no longer exist. Folks reprinted the official copy of their licences and the language about the Line A prohibition no longer appeared. 
Try logging into your license manager at fcc and see. 

[WRYZ926]

6 minutes ago, SteveShannon said:

Some time ago it appears that these prohibitions no longer exist. Folks reprinted the official copy of their licences and the language about the Line A prohibition no longer appeared. 

When was that change made?

I just looked at the copy of my GMRS license that I saved to my computer in October 2023 and it still states the Lina A/Line C restrictions.

[Socalgmrs]

Omg.  There is no travel channel.  It’s not what gmrs is for. 90plus percent of people are going to run tones.  Most of those people think it’s a privacy thing and no one can hear them.   Anyway your going to be reaching out on 19,22,21,16 what ever and no one can here you because of tones.   Soooo let’s just close the book on this.  If you want to talk to randos on the highway get a cb and atleast in my area learn one of 2 new new languages. because engrish is not going to cut it.  
 

since cell phones now cover 99.9% of the us I’m going to bet your odds of getting aaa or 911 on a cell phone are much greater then some rando on gmrs.    Just use it for what it is and stop making more of it than it is. It’s not a Swiss Army knife.  

[WRTC928]

I like the idea of an agreed-upon channel for travel/emergencies, but FCC apparently has no interest in selecting one and nobody else has the mantle of authority to decree one. Amateur radio has ARRL. Although they don't have any actual power to enforce their band plans and calling frequencies, the vast majority of users go along with ARRL's plans. We don't have anything comparable for GMRS, as far as I know.

[marcspaz]

The US/Canada treaty that established the Line A/B/C/D radio restrictions expired a decade ago. The FCC removed the limits from PRS (GMRS) with the 2017 updates.

[WRYZ926]

2 minutes ago, marcspaz said:

The US/Canada treaty that established the Line A/B/C/D radio restrictions expired a decade ago. The FCC removed the limits from PRS (GMRS) with the 2017 updates.

Yet they still put those restriction on GMRS licenses. Or at least they did as of October 2023.

[marcspaz]

14 minutes ago, Socalgmrs said:

Omg.  There is no travel channel.  It’s not what gmrs is for. 90plus percent of people are going to run tones.  Most of those people think it’s a privacy thing and no one can hear them.   Anyway your going to be reaching out on 19,22,21,16 what ever and no one can here you because of tones.   Soooo let’s just close the book on this.  If you want to talk to randos on the highway get a cb and atleast in my area learn one of 2 new new languages. because engrish is not going to cut it.  
 

since cell phones now cover 99.9% of the us I’m going to bet your odds of getting aaa or 911 on a cell phone are much greater then some rando on gmrs.    Just use it for what it is and stop making more of it than it is. It’s not a Swiss Army knife.  

 

While i think you are very antagonist/disrespectful in a vast majority of your posts, and have a tendency to be wrong in a lot of your posts about tech and rules, I actually agree with the general sentiment of your comment.

 

However, cell coverage is far from 99% of the US. They fudge the numbers by saying 99%+ of the population... not 99% of the land mass. It's closer to to 3.5%-4% of the total square miles of the US having (somewhat) continuous coverage, and only about 53% (which includes that 3.5%-4%) of square miles has a 70% reliability rate of cell service.  Things like two-way radios and satellite communications are critical in about 47%+ of the country.

[marcspaz]

14 minutes ago, WRYZ926 said:

Yet they still put those restriction on GMRS licenses. Or at least they did as of October 2023.

 

I have a copy of my license from 2018 and it's not on my license. I downloaded a new copy about 5 minutes ago, and no reference to it today, either. 

[WRYZ926]

Well it sure is on my license. Here is a photos of mine.

[WSHH887]

Just looked at mine and no such restrictions are in place.  Interestingly the form 605-G has a date of 2007.  So one would think they haven't put any restrictions on the license since that form was issued.

Bue we are dealing with the federal government.

[WRYZ926]

1 minute ago, WSHH887 said:

Just looked at mine and no such restrictions are in place.  Interestingly the form 605-G has a date of 2007.  So one would think they haven't put any restrictions on the license since that form was issued.

I was issued my license on 11 October 2023 and the form is FCC 605-G August 2007 and as you can see the restriction is on my license.

[marcspaz]

9 minutes ago, WRYZ926 said:

I was issued my license on 11 October 2023 and the form is FCC 605-G August 2007 and as you can see the restriction is on my license.

 

Very odd. You can definitely ignore it. The treaty is long gone and the restrictions were removed almost a decade ago. 

[WRUE951]

38 minutes ago, marcspaz said:

 

 

 

However, cell coverage is far from 99% of the US. They fudge the numbers by saying 99%+ of the population... not 99% of the land mass.

Ain't that the truth.  We did a road trip from Calif to Minnesota two  years ago..  I would say our cell service was was hit and miss about 60 percent good and even though we had cell service didn't mean we could connect to internet most of the time..  We learned there is actually two levels of service, Cell and Internet.  And even now i believe some cellular companies are teaming up with Starlink to expand cell coverage but not Internet.    We now have Starlink and use it on Roaming when on the road and never been without internet connectvity since.  

[amaff]

1 hour ago, WRYZ926 said:

Well it sure is on my license. Here is a photos of mine.

When was that from? Just checked mine now and it's not on it:

[WRYZ926]

15 minutes ago, amaff said:

When was that from? Just checked mine now and it's not on it:

What I posted is a photo of my license that I downloaded and printed in October 2023.