Trip Report: AT&T TDMA Coverage from Lancaster, CA to Carefree, AZ

[dglively]

The following is a report of observed AT&T TDMA coverage for an area roughly
covering a straight line between Lancaster, California (just southwest of
Edwards AFB) to Carefree, Arizona (15 miles north of Scottsdale).

Recently, my wife and I took a quick vacation to Carefree, Arizona. My
lovely wife is a licensed pilot and we made this trip in our Piper Cherokee
180. We departed Santa Rosa/Sonoma County airport and our fuel stop for the
trip was in Lancaster at Fox Field. AT&T’s TDMA coverage at Fox Field is
good enough if you have an open view of town. However, inside the terminal
building or on the north side of the buildings coverage is poor. The airport
is about 5 miles northwest of town and the terrain is pretty flat so I’m
guessing right in town coverage is probably pretty good. We made a couple
calls and I’d rate the quality a 2.5 on a 5 scale.

From Fox Field we flew a straight line heading to Twenty-nine Palms and then
a straight line heading to Carefree, all at 9,500 feet. For kicks, I
monitored reception as we flew over the southern California and central
Arizona desert and, while this type information may not be entirely useful
for the average person, found some interesting results. From Lancaster to
over Hesperia and Apple Valley, then along side Big Bear (about 15 mile out
to the north over Lucerne Valley) and on to Twenty-nine Palms I received 3
out of 4 bars the entire way. There is a huge dead zone between Twenty-nine
Palms (about 20 miles out to the east) and the California-Arizona border.
Once we began to close in on the Colorado River reception resumed and began
to improve. We crossed into Arizona about 10 miles south of Parker. Then, as
we moved east beyond the river basin reception faded out again until we were
about 30 miles out from Aguila, Arizona.

From Aguila we flew a straight line towards the Pleasant Valley Lake dam.
Reception was good south of Wickenburg, over Morristown and north of
Wittmann. When we reach Pleasant Valley Lake we began to descend to 5,500
and crossed I-17 just north of the Carefree highway at about 4,000 feet. At
this point my phone went into ‘extended area’ mode at 3 bars and stayed that
way until we were on final for Carefree and over The Boulders resort. I
tried to call a friend on the ground at Carefree while the phone was in
‘extended area’ mode, however despite a good reception reading every time I
pressed ‘send’ I got the fast-beep circuits busy signal. Tried 4 times in 10
minutes but couldn’t get through. Once we landed I was getting 3 of 4 bars
and AT&T digital TDMA home area coverage.

On the ground and in all the places we went coverage was fair to good,
certainly not great. On Pima road between Scottsdale and Carefree coverage
is good enough and was the same on the Carefree highway all the way to I-17.
In Anthem the coverage is also good, but not great.

In summary I’d say that it is evident that there is no effort going into
TDMA and as time goes by consumers would be best advised to switch to the
newer expanding technologies. That’s what I’ll be doing.

I’d be happy to entertain any questions anyone might have regarding this
report.

[Tony E!]

Thanks for the info Dglively, i hear Att has a new name for their GSM service call GSM AMERICA and are claimimg that their coverage has more than double according to the commercial i heard on the radio, if that is true, i wouldn't mind getting a Motorola v600.

[KevinJames]

Its doubled probably due to the Cingular agreement to permit roaming.

[Rasputin]

Originally posted by: KevinJames
Its doubled probably due to the Cingular agreement to permit roaming.

Well Put, you better have a gsm phone that will do 850Mhz cellular, to get that coverage.

[Tony E!]

Originally posted by: KevinJames
Its doubled probably due to the Cingular agreement to permit roaming.

yes definitely.[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

[budney]

Thank you dglively for the info. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

[dglively]

I realize that while reporting reception level from a small aircraft might not be all the usefull it is, none the less, interesting. We're planning a trip flying to Ashland, Oregon in July and a flying trip to Reno during the fall. By then, however, we will have switched to Verizon.

So, look for my next "Airborn Observations" report in late July