IncrEase: A tool for incremental planning of rural fixed Broadband Wireless Access networks

Abstract

The coverage footprint of most Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) networks is not set in stone but varies over its lifetime, usually by expanding incrementally as new transmissions sites are rolled out or by adding capacity as demand changes and increases. We thus propose the incremental planning paradigm as an effective strategy for planning and deploying BWA networks, such as those operated by WISPs or community organisations. We believe incremental planning allows to anticipate return of investment and to overcome the limited network infrastructure (e.g., backhaul fibre links) in rural areas. Our IncrEase tool elaborates a varied set of operational metrics to guide the operator in identifying the regions that would benefit the most from a network upgrade, automatically suggesting the set of "moves" (e.g., new transmission sites to deploy) that leads to the best long term strategy. We benchmark the computation time of our tool and evaluate it using data from a large-scale ISP network with access to over 8,900 transmission towers.

A Multi-objective Approach for Wireless Heterogeneous Router Placement in Rural Wireless Mesh Networks

“…Let p be an ER at position(x, y). If R j is located in p that means the centre of R j is Ctr(j) = (x, y), then the set of ERs covered by R j , CA j , is given by (5).…”

“…This is achieved by minimizing the number and identifying the locations of router nodes that will maximise the percentage of the region to cover. For this reason, the planning of WMNs in rural areas has been considered as coverage-driven instead of capacity-driven [5], meaning that we have an area to cover rather than a set of users to supply. Pötsch et al proposed a network planning tool for rural wireless ISPs [6].…”

Zyxt

“…Only a few alternative planning models have also been proposed. IncrEase [6] is a planning paradigm that incrementally introduces sets of additional transmission sites. In [25], the authors describe a mathematical model for automated network planning that considers economic and technical constraints.…”

Finding repeater placement for P2P wireless links with NLOS in extremely mountainous regions

“…These works concentrate on describing specific implemented solutions, but they do not address the network design problems, nor optimization procedures. In [10] a tool for incremental planning of wireless networks is presented, but is limited to network expansion rather than initial design. Other solutions for rural scenarios are mesh networks, which can be implemented with WiFi or WiMAX stardards [11]- [13], and Satellite options can be considered as well.…”