NOVA SCOTIA MUNICIPAL POLICE VHF NETWORK
A component of the NSIMRS
Last updated Oct 2, 2021

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THIS IS AN HISTORICAL PAGE.  THIS SYSTEM NO LONGER EXISTS AND THEREFORE THERE ARE NO CONFIDENTIALITY ISSUES.

This system was a component of the NS Integrated Mobile Radio System, which operated throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s.    While most of NSIMRS was replaced by the TMR in and around the year 2000, some or most of the repeaters in the Municipal Police Network lingered on for years.  This network had the purpose of allowing municipal police forces to have a common channel for use throughout an area with multiple departments, and also to allow communicating with departments in other areas of the province.   Prior to the RCMP migration to TMR it also allowed for local forces to talk with RCMP, who also in that era used VHF radio. 

Compared to the other components of NSIMRS I have relatively little information on the Municipal Police Network as it was not a publically disclosed system.  It is my understanding that there was only one frequency pair used on multiple repeaters.   It also appears that the network repeaters were not installed on many of the 24 NSIMRS towers as they would only be usefulin areas where town police forces existed.    I have no evidence that a repeater was installed at Hammonds Plains, as the Halifax and Dartmouth police forces do not seem to have been part of this network.  All other departments in the province do seem to have had access, at least in theory.  Note that there were many more town police forces in the 1980’s as compared to 2021.  Examples of departments that have been replaced by RCMP since then are: Springhill, Wolfville, Hantsport, Mahone Bay, Middleton, Lunenburg and Berwick.   It is known that the repeater at McLellans Mountain remained in place until at least 2015 as it was used for interdepartment liaison in the New Glasgow area.

In the chart below, repeaters are only shown for sites where there is evidence that there was in fact a municipal police repeater. It might be expected, based on the proximity of local police forces, that repeaters would have also been in operation at Sherwood (for Bridgewater, Lunenburg and Mahone Bay PD's), at Sugarloaf (for Amherst and Springhill), for Nuttby Mtn (for Truro), and at Rear Boisdale or other area sites (for the various Sydney area departments), and possibly also North Range Corner (for Annapolis Royal PD).   No information has been seen to indicate that these actually existed but this was a little-known network with no public listing, the gaps might simply result from no scanner listener reporting them.    Those that are listed were actually heard on air in the late 90's.    It is interesting to note that the Shubie repeater is not in an area served by any local police service.  It is within the realm of possibility that this repeater was actually at Nuttby but I have heard that the signal was much stronger at Shubenacadie than at Truro.

CHART BASED ON PARTIAL INFORMATION ONLY.  INFORMATION IS LACKING
REGARDING MANY ASPECTS OF THIS NETWORK