Their thinking is limited and short term. (Score 1)

To solve the problem, the FCC is considering reshuffling channels in the 800 megahertz band. The idea is to separate the wireless companies from the public safety departments, so they inhabit different ends of the band. None of the companies is doing anything wrong, FCC officials said. As organized, the spectrum, which is a limited resource, simply can't accommodate everyone.

Reorganization would be rife with all manner of contention and expensive reconfiguration. But as painful as it may sound, this is only one dimension of needed improvements for 800MHz band usage. Also sorely needed is more efficient modulation modes and more consistent allocation and constraint in both RF spectrum and geographical extent of the services on the band. They should emphasize improving the spectrum efficiency of the equipment living in the 800 MHz world. Just moving frequency allocations around, even if it makes the allocation chart look cleaner, is merely playing 8-puzzle with the band. Using CSMA-style systems where everyone is code-divided, some point-to-point cell phones and some "common channel"-type equipment functionally identical to current two-way radios would solve more problems than simple reallocation.

This would also erase the decades of creeping allocation and other idiocy which put the band into such a region of intermodulation.

(And while they improving the efficiency of the band, give us back 824 through 848 MHz on scanners. The "cell block" law is just moronic, ineffective, and today an utterly unnecessary reminder of how laws are bought to cover up for insufficient design.)