Maritimes Scanning Site

Last updated March 16, 2008

A. Municipal 800 MHz Trunk

THIS SYSTEM IS NO MORE!  DECOMMISSIONED AND DISMANTLED IN SUMMER 2006.  INFORMATION REMAINS HERE ONLY FOR INTEREST'S SAKE.  ALL USERS ARE NOW ON THE NS TRUNK.. NSTMRS.  INFORMATION FARTHER DOWN RE METRO TRANSIT DISPATCH TO BUS COMMUNICATIONS REMAINS CURRENT.

This system is gone!  It formerly served the Police, Fire Services, Works, Transit, and the Military Police and Commissionaires.   All of these services are now carried on the NS Trunk and are not described here.   Some HRM services remain on conventional VHF and UHF  systems and are described below, following the historical description of the dismantled municipal trunk.

The "Halifax City Trunk" was a Motorola hybrid  SmartZone system with two repeater sites:  Geizers Hill and Downtown.  Each had its own set of 10 frequencies, with the lowest being 862.6375 MHz (at Geizers Hill).  The Downtown frequencies began at 862.7375 MHz.  

B. OTHER MUNICIPAL RADIO SERVICES

1. Fire Services:   This service operates on the NS Trunk (TMR) and with VHF pages.  For information click on the NS Fire page.

2. Police Services:  This service operates on the NS Trunk (TMR) with digital communications (some encrypted) Click on the NS Police page.

3. Metro Transit:  Call Sign: XJN986    Bus inspectors and maintenance vehicles use the HRM 800 MHz trunk system (see above); however the buses themselves use a 400 MHz conventional system.  Buses are heard on occasion on the trunk but this is through a patch system allowing them to speak directly to the maintenance department.  The 400 MHz communication is mostly on the taxi format - the base transmits on one frequency and the mobile (bus) transmits on the other (higher) frequency of the pair.  Thus the drivers cannot hear each other.  The Access-a-Bus system on the other hand uses a repeater system, in which the base and mobile transmit on the high frequency to the repeater which transmits on the low frequency of the pair, and all listen on this frequency and therefore can hear each other.   Frequencies are as follows:

There is known to be an emergency frequency, which is likely one of those listed above.    It is also known that control can activate the microphone and transmitter in individual buses in order to monitor situations.   

There is an automatic position reporting system used for customer call-in re bus arrival times.  This may use UHF and may be the data channel listed above.  It appears to be "always on".

4. Municipal Works and Parks:   Works and Parks moved to the NS Trunk (800 MHz) in 2006.  For information on talkgroups see my list of talkgroups in the NS TMR section of this website. In 2007 the underground services (sewer) components of Municipal Works were reassigned to "Halifax Water" -- see below.   The following 400 MHz frequencies were formerly used by HRM Works and may yet be available for backup use, or for other HRM services.   An interesting point to be made is that these in turn were formerly the frequencies used by the HRM Police and Fire before they migrated to 800 MHz in the early 1990's or before.

411.2625 MHz (rptr out) - intended to be used by Technical and Underground Services (TUGS) for sewer maintenance, but currently also in use by other works users as mentioned below.  This frequency has been frequently heard with street operations in the Dartmouth area.

412.8125 and 412.8625 MHz (rptr outputs).  These are linked repeaters situated at Mt Edward and at Queens Square respectively, but thought to be out of service due to severe damage to the Mt. Edward tower by Hurricane Juan in the fall of 2003.   Services that normally would have used this system are thought to be using the TUGS frequency.  Please note that these are former police frequencies.

413.6875 (rptr output) - thought to be a leftover from the former town of Bedford system and used by works department and hired vehicles in the Bedford-Sackville area.   Heard often regarding snowplowing, including the sidewalk bobcats, and also street patching.

416.0125 (simplex) - Streets and Roads simplex

867.2500 MHz - this is listed in the TAFL for use by Streets and Roads, and may be the simplex frequency used by units that are otherwise utilizing the HRM trunk.

Housing Authority:  This information may be outdated.  The authority has or had a repeater on 452.3375 MHz.

Water Commission:  This semi-independent organization was in 2008 operating on several repeaters with outputs in the 143 MHz range.   In mid-2007 its operations were merged with those of the underground services (sewer services) of the Halifax Regional Municipality.  It is unknown at time of writing if the merged organization will use the 143 MHz frequencies or the 800 MHz trunked talkgroups of the sewer services.   The merged organization is called Halifax Water.