For years the rumor mills have been rampant with reports that the railroads are going to be going to NXDN at any time and our older analog scanners will no longer be useful form listening to rail traffic. Then all of a sudden the big focus was on PTC (Positive Train Control) and NXDN activity slowed considerably. So now what is the story on NXDN and can we still hear railroads when and if they switch?
First the background:
Railroads have used good old plain analog FM for decades and have been a staple of scanner listeners from the start. With almost 100 VHF channels between 160.215 and 161.610 it is simple to listen to, even if you don’t know what channels they actually use. Just scan all the channels or set the scanner to search them. A few years back they (and most other radio users) switched to what is called “Narrow Band”, where a smaller RF footprint is used to allow more channels to be stuck in between existing ones.
Eventually the railroads, thru their coordinating body called AAR (Association of American Railroads) decided that radio communications would be switched eventually to a digital format. While P25 was chosen at first, they changed their minds and decided to use NXDN instead. This was based on cost in part and while this meant cheaper radio equipment for the railroads, NXDN scanners are more expensive for consumers.
The plan was for railroads to replace their radio equipment with NXDN capable radios and when all the radios were in place they would start switching over piece by piece. Since railroads are very intertwined this had to be done in an orderly and planned fashion. Systems with limited scope, such as yards and shops, have been switched in some areas but for the most part the vast majority of radio traffic on the railroads is still on analog as they have been forever.
The biggest reason railroads have not switched over to NXDN already for Road and other operations is PTC. Positive Train Control is a system mandated by federal law that helps control the operation of trains to prevent collisions. After a series of crashes, including one in California where the engineer of a train was texting and failed to stop properly, PTC was mandated. This is a huge undertaking by the railroads, pretty much reinventing the wheel on how trains are operated and controlled. It requires huge investments in technology, both on the train and on the track as well as in the dispatch centers.
Due to the huge investments in money, effort and training involved in PTC other technology, including the NXDN conversion, have been slowed considerably. PTC has taken much longer and much more money than first anticipated and the same staff that would have been tasked with the NXDN conversion have been working on PTC. Once PTC is completed and paid for the railroads can start back to work on NXDN.
Most FCC licenses for railroad frequencies have already been updated to add NXDN and any new radios purchased are usually NXDN capable. As existing non-NXDN capable base station and lineside radios are replaced due to age, defect or otherwise they are usually replaced with NXDN capable units, but programmed for analog. Once dates are set for conversion to NXDN then they will be reprogrammed for that and NXDN operations will start. Locomotive, vehicular and portable radios are handled the same way, capable of NXDN but used in the analog mode until the switchover is scheduled.
So, what does all this mean for the scanner listener? Well, the answer is that when they switch to NXDN you will need an NXDN capable scanner to hear them. There are several scanners available now that will work for NXDN systems, these include the TRX-1/2, the BCD325/996P2, the BCD436/536HP and the SDS100/200. (Remember that Uniden scanners require the extra-cost NXDN upgrade for these channels.)
With the NXDN conversion there are going to be some other changes. More voice channels will be available, the technology increases the number of channels available. Some traffic that is currently done by voice might be converted to data or text. There is also the possibility of using encryption, although we really hope they don’t!
