Comparing trunked and conventional traffic handling

The diagram illustrates the traffic-handling properties of trunked and conventional systems. The conventional system has the same capacity per channel regardless the number of channels. For a trunked system, the per-channel capacity grows exponentially with the number of channels at a given site. In other words, a conventional system can handle about 70 users per channel, 140 per two channels, etc. In a trunked system the more channels you have, the more users per channel your system will handle.

Some simple rules of thumb:

• If your agencies can be split into functional groups of 70 or fewer users who rarely need to speak to others, they will likely be well served by a conventional system.
• If you have three or fewer such groups, it will be sufficient to give each their own conventional channel.
• For organizations larger than this, you should consider trunking, primarily because trunking systems of four or more channels have better traffic handling capacity than a similar number of conventional channels.
• There are many conventional systems larger than this that function to the satisfaction of their users. While trunking is recommended for larger systems, it is not a must.

Consider your specific requirements and all available data – including current patterns of usage – before making the final decision.