Here’s my simple, and scope limited explanation for review. You may agreed or disagree and YMMV.
To Whit
particularly looking for feedback/comments from folks in Class2
So we have 2.5 user classes here on BC West Coast and a 3rd class in USA as part of Cascadia mesh.
Class1 - general users, until a few month back I’d say that was a large part of the net on this side of the border, people doing community stuff together for one reason or another
Class2 - Emcomm/Ham radio focus groups
2.5 - a mix of class 1 and 2
Class 3 - USA based, Large number of users and repeaters, lots of general users and lots of control level folks like Jade somewhere between Class1 and 2
The overall problem is heavy load from USA repeaters causing congestion and reduced capability on our side of the border. It’s a reason sometimes it takes 2 or 3 attempts to get a group or direct message to be successfully delivered, or be able to reliably access the admin or telemetry page for a remote repeater.
For the general community, that’s an irritation, but crux of the problem for both Abbottsford and Vancouver Island are they are clearly Class 2 folks. For them operational functionality comes before general community functionality.
Both made the decision to try out switching frequencies from 525 to 425 and that significantly reduced load and improved operational functionality for their operational environments. Since it was operationally better they’ve made the decision to stay on 425. On the flip side this created holes in the rest of the net for all areas on 525.
Some would say implement Region settings as the solution, maybe…, however Region settings on the repeaters getting hammered along the border doesn’t reduce the packet or RF load those repeaters have to deal with and leave the upstreams congestion issues still in place.
With all that background, I suggest our overall goal for all classes above is find a way to keep classes 1, 2 and 2.5 functionally operational AND intercommunication AND reduce the RF/packet load from the USA.
That’s my take, have at it.