P3Mobility sought an FCC waiver to deploy cellular vehicle-to-everything technology in the 5.9 GHz band. “While pilot projects have provided vital information to the industry, those only constitute a small fraction of C-V2X safety capabilities,” said a filing Friday in docket 19-138: “Expedited deployment of these technologies is necessary to further the Commission’s goal to promote traffic safety and protect the American public.”

The Federal Railroad Administration sought comment on requests for amendment by BNSF Railway and Kansas City Southern Railway of their positive train control plans. Comments on the BNSF proposal are due March 19 in docket FRA-2010-0056, the Kansas City proposal March 27 in FRA-2010-0059, said Monday notices in the Federal Register.

Public Knowledge representatives met with an aide to FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr on a January white paper by the group on spectrum policy. “In Back to the Spectrum Future, PK proposes a backcasting framework for spectrum policy decisionmaking based on the public interest principles that are embedded in the Telecommunications Act,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 18-295: “This approach to policymaking focuses on envisioning a desirable future, then backcasting the policies that are needed to get to that future.”

A new edition of NTIA’s Manual of Regulations and Procedures for Federal Radio Frequency Management is effective Monday, said a notice for Monday’s Federal Register. The manual is “the compilation of policies and procedures that govern the use of the radio frequency spectrum by the U.S. Government,” the notice said. “Federal Government agencies are required to follow these policies and procedures in their use of spectrum.”

The Mobile World Congress in Barcelona was a success this year, with large numbers of people returning for the first time since 2019, said GSMA Ltd. CEO John Hoffman during a session Thursday, the conference's final day. GSMA reported attendance of 88,500, from 202 countries and territories. That’s fewer than the 109,000 reported in 2019 but up from 61,000 last year. Hoffman noted MWC canceled in 2020 because of COVID-19, the first major event hit by the pandemic: “We didn’t know what [the virus] was. It wasn’t supposedly in Europe yet, but it was.” Speakers noted the conference honored Marty Cooper, the father of the cellphone, who made the first cellular call 50 years ago next month. “We’re looking at the past because we want to see how far we’ve come, but also we want to see the velocity and speed of going to the future,” said Zina Jarrahi Cinker, director general of Matter, an international think tank. MWC needs to offer more space next year, she said, saying hundreds of people wanted to get into events on quantum computing and frontier technologies, but “they had only capacity for 30 and 40." People “have done more deals, met with more people than ever before,” said Lara Dewar, GSMA chief marketing officer. “As digital technologies continue to develop, there is new excitement in the air that MWC captured so well,” said GSMA Director General Mats Granryd: “The transition to Web 3.0 will trigger a new explosion in network traffic, and it is critical that we work together to prepare.” 5G is "mainstream now; it’s no longer the new boy on the block,” said Adrian Dodd, head-GSMA Services, on a second panel. Sustainability “is on everybody’s lips,” he said: “That means devices are lasting much longer on the networks, which has a set of challenges. … More and more we’re going to see older devices with lower capabilities, younger devices with higher capabilities.” With devices lasting longer, trade-in programs are becoming more important, he said. 5G has “only just started,” despite all the discussion at MWC about 6G, said Barney Stinton, GSMA head-membership.

Representatives of the Edison Electric Institute and Evergy met virtually with staff from the FCC Office of Engineering and Technology to discuss tests Evergy did last year on potential interference from 6 GHz low-power indoor operations to utility use of the band. The Kansas City-based utility offered a technical explanation of problems uncovered by the tests, said a filing posted Thursday in docket 18-295. “The participants emphasized that protecting existing 6 GHz networks remains a vital issue for electric companies,” EEI and Evergy said: “These 6 GHz communications networks are particularly necessary for the safety of electric company personnel and to maintain the backbone of electric companies’ operations not only day-to-day, but also, during emergencies and disasters such as ice storms, tornadoes, and hurricanes.”

The FCC's Communications Security, Reliability, and Interoperability Council scheduled its seventh meeting March 21, starting at 1 p.m. EDT, the FCC said Thursday in a Federal Register notice. The meeting will be hybrid, both at FCC headquarters and via conference call. The December meeting was supposed to be partially in person, for the first time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the FCC made it virtual because of an expected ice storm (see 2212150070).

Energy associations, the Enterprise Wireless Alliance and other groups asked the FCC to extend by 60 days deadlines to file comments on the details of implementing a new leasing model for the 4.9 GHz band. Comments are due March 30, replies May 1, in docket 07-100, in response to a Further NPRM approved by commissioners in January (see 2301180062). “The FCC has made several attempts to optimize use of the 4.9 GHz band while preserving public safety prioritization,” said a Thursday filing: “The Nationwide Band Manager/secondary lease approach has substantial promise, but, as always, the devil is in the details. It is essential that the decisions made based on the record in response to the … Further Notice allow that approach to achieve the FCC’s objectives.” The public interest won’t “be harmed by a modest delay in these deadlines in a proceeding that has been under consideration for an extended period already.” The filing was also signed by the American Petroleum Institute, American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, the Forestry Conservation Communications Association, the International Municipal Signal Association, the National Sheriffs’ Association and the Utilities Technology Council.

The FCC gave Choice Wireless the waiver it sought of a requirement to file data on its now closed CDMA network as part of broadband data collection submissions due Wednesday. Choice said it shuttered the network Jan. 3 (see 2302230047). “We find that the recent shutdown of Choice’s CDMA network constitutes ‘special circumstances’ that warrant a deviation from the rule,” said a Tuesday order by the Wireless Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics: “We also find that granting Choice’s Petition is in the public interest and consistent with the objectives of the Broadband DATA Act and the Commission’s effort to develop more granular and accurate broadband data.”

The National Consumer Law Center asked the FCC to tweak language in a draft robotexting order and Further NPRM (see 2302230059) to make clear that the FCC determined in 2003 “that texts are calls for purposes of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act,1 that it specifically applied the Do Not Call regulations to wireless telephone numbers in 47 C.F.R 64.1200(e), and that numerous courts have applied the Do Not Call rules to texts.” The center urged the FCC to change the words “extending,” “extend” and “extension” for application of the do not call registry to “clarifying,” “clarify” and “clarification,” in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-402.