Microcellular propagation characteristics for personal communications in urban and suburban environments

New microcellular systems have been proposed to operate over short radio paths by using low-base station antennas, and transmitting at low power. In order to study radio propagation in the microcellular environments for future personal communications services (PCS), comprehensive radio propagation measurements were conducted by Telesis Technologies Laboratory (TTL) in the San Francisco Bay area using three transmitting antenna heights of 3.2, 8.7, and 13.4 m and two frequencies in the 900 and 1900 MHz bands. The paper reports the path loss measurements made in urban and suburban areas where the receiving mobile was driven along preselected line-of-sight (LOS), zig-zag, and staircase routes to gather information about direct propagation along streets, as well as diffraction over the roofs in suburban areas, and diffraction around the corners in urban areas. The results obtained for the three antenna heights are studied, and show the height gain that can be expected for microcells in different environments