More Airwave Frequencies Made Available

Responding to increased demands for use, the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday expanded the number of airwaves available for services ranging from cellular mobile telephones to two-way police radios.

In the action, which could generate billions of dollars of new business, the commission parceled out some of the last remaining frequencies available for ground-based communications.

FCC Chairman Mark S. Fowler said the decision will go a long way “to help meet America’s radio needs.” However, he and other commissioners noted that a decision on how to meet conflicting demands for increasingly scarce frequencies has been one of the most difficult issues that the agency has faced.

To deal with the problem, Fowler raised the possibility of auctioning these precious public resources to the highest bidder.

“It is nothing less than a national sin to give away for free this extraordinarily valuable resource--especially in these times of fiscal austerity,” he said. An FCC staff member estimated that at least $2 billion could have been generated by an auction for awarding licenses to operate cellular mobile telephone systems in the nation’s top 30 cities.

As an example of the growth in private land mobile radio, which includes two-way commercial and public safety communications, Commissioner Dennis R. Patrick said that there are more than 1.2 million authorized stations today, compared to 950,000 stations authorized in 1984.

“In several major cities, there are no unused channels available for assignment,” he said.