Planning of an IEEE 802.16e Network for Emergency and Safety Services

An overlaid Wimax cellular structure is proposed for emergency and safety services, with micro-cells covering urban hotspots over a macro-cellular structure. In the region of Beira Interior the process of cellular planning has to account for carrier-to-noise-interference ratio. Sectorisation is used in order to reduce reuse patterns and increase system capacity, while cell overlay is proposed to overcome coverage problems in large towns and cities. Geographic Information Systems tools are considered for Line-of-Sight discovery, and ~75% of LoS coverage is guaranteed in the city of Covilhã. The point-to-point component is also being incorporated in the planning tool. By comparing the 3.5GHz and the 5.8GHz bands one concludes that it is possible to use lower values of the antenna gains in the first case.