Puerto Rican GMRS repeaters

[jerrym58]

Hello, I'm just curious about this.  I would like to hear from someone in Puerto Rico on this subject.  Why are there so many GMRS repeaters in the small island territory of Puerto Rico?  A search on this site showed over 180 and there must be many more that are not registered here.   In Oklahoma, we cover most of the state with less than 20 repeaters on a local ham radio UHF linked repeater system and Oklahoma is many times larger in land area than PR.   Thanks in advance, Jerry WQWM239

[marzancastro]

Hi @jerrym58, 

If you compare the topography of Oklahoma and Puerto Rico you'll notice the huge difference. In the center of Puerto Rico covering mostly all the island there is a mountain range called the "Cordillera Central" with mountains exceeding the 4Kfeet, so GMRS being UHF will be greatly limited.  Besides this,  throughout all the North, there are many small limestone/calcium carbonate mountains, so overall Puerto Rico is a mountainous island being small in overall area. I believe this is the reason there's so many GMRS repeaters, more repeaters are needed to cover the same area compared to OK.

Hope this is somewhat helpful.

[Radioguy7268]

I'd also point out that in 2017, when Hurricane Maria blasted through Puerto Rico, many people were basically left to fend for themselves, and went weeks and months without grid power, running water, or even cellular service. This was especially bad in the inland areas up in the mountains, but was still an issue even in areas outside of Ponce & San Juan.

They aren't necessarily doing this for overall footprint, they're doing it to allow for localized reception in pockets and areas that aren't served by larger systems. They also want to maintain control and ownership of the repeaters, and not rely on someone else to keep a system powered up 24/7.

 

[WRTC928]

6 hours ago, Radioguy7268 said:

I'd also point out that in 2017, when Hurricane Maria blasted through Puerto Rico, many people were basically left to fend for themselves, and went weeks and months without grid power, running water, or even cellular service. This was especially bad in the inland areas up in the mountains, but was still an issue even in areas outside of Ponce & San Juan.

They aren't necessarily doing this for overall footprint, they're doing it to allow for localized reception in pockets and areas that aren't served by larger systems. They also want to maintain control and ownership of the repeaters, and not rely on someone else to keep a system powered up 24/7.

 

That makes a lot of sense. Likely I'd do the same in similar circumstances.