CTIA urged the FCC to move with care on new wireless emergency alert rules, scheduled for a vote at commissioners' Sept. 29 meeting (see 1609080083). Revised rules should be tailored to encourage “voluntary private/public partnership with government stakeholders,” CTIA said in a filing in docket 15-91. “It is crucial that changes to the WEA service are carefully developed and deployed to ensure that consumer experiences and expectations are properly managed,” the group said. “The wireless industry is concerned that excessive modifications to WEA may lead to confusion by the public or may overwhelm wireless subscribers with either confusing or duplicative information. This may have the unintended effect of subscribers choosing to opt out of the service.”

The FCC Wireless Bureau approved an order allowing the Southern California Regional Rail Authority (SCRRA) to obtain spectrum from the Automated Maritime Telecommunications System so it can install positive train control (PTC). SCRRA oversees the Metrolink commuter railroad, which operates seven train lines serving 55 train stations on over 500 track miles, the bureau said. On an average weekday, the system serves more than 40,000 commuters. Rail safety has been an issue for the system, the bureau noted. In 2008, a Metrolink commuter train collided with a Union Pacific freight train, killing 25 passengers and injuring more than 100, the bureau said. The National Transportation Safety Board said PTC would have prevented the accident. “We conclude that grant of the SCRRA Applications and related waiver requests will further the vital public interest in rail safety and is consistent with the federal PTC mandate,” the order said.

The Wireless Infrastructure Association will partner with the Smart Cities Council to develop and promote programming for Smart Cities Week Sept. 27-29 in Washington and at WIA’s HetNet Expo Oct. 25-26 in Houston, WIA said in a Tuesday news release. The events will include panels and keynote speeches on the intersection of smart city efforts and wireless networking, WIA said.

CTIA attacked the validity of a Berkeley, California, cellphone warning ordinance on RF emissions exposure, in oral argument Tuesday at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (see 1608260019). “Today we presented our argument that the lower court created new law in this case that dramatically weakens First Amendment protections and contradicts binding decisions of the Ninth Circuit as well as the Supreme Court,” a CTIA spokeswoman emailed. “The Ninth Circuit previously invalidated a similar cellphone ordinance in San Francisco.” The FCC, health experts and scientific evidence show the Berkeley warnings are misleading, she said. The city didn’t comment.

Results of a Morning Consult poll Monday said 68 percent of respondents who had heard of the next-generation iPhones said they're “unlikely to buy” when they become available Friday. Responses show “the buying public isn’t inspired by the tech giant’s presentation,” during last week’s launch, it said in an announcement. Just 21 percent of those familiar with the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus said they’re likely to buy one, it said. Apple should be concerned about a “decline in interest” compared with that for the iPhone 6s, said the researcher. When the iPhone 6s released last year, 33 percent of respondents who had heard of that model’s rollout said they were likely to buy it vs. 63 percent who said they were unlikely to do so, said the report. On the loss of the headphone jack -- requiring owners to use wireless headphones or a dongle to connect wired headphones through the Lightning jack -- 21 percent said they’d be more likely to buy the phone as a result, and 19 percent said it makes them less likely to purchase, said the poll. Forty-one percent they’d be more likely to buy an iPhone 7 because of the improved camera, but the same percentage said it made no difference. Forty-seven percent said the water resistant feature makes them more likely to buy the new phone, but 36 percent said the feature didn’t affect their purchase plans. The iPhone 7 will be splash and water resistant, something 47 percent of respondents said would make their purchase more likely, while 36 percent said it makes no difference. The poll was done Sept. 6-8 among a national sample of 1,961 respondents with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Apple’s new iPhone 7 doesn't cover band 66, which contains most of the spectrum sold by the FCC in the AWS-3 auction, Wells Fargo analyst Jennifer Fritzsche emailed to investors. “The only AWS spectrum bands supported by the iPhone 7 are in Band 4 (AWS-1 channels A-F),” she wrote. “This indicates that any 2016 or 2017 AWS-3 network deployments will likely be waiting until the next release of the iPhone -- September 2017 -- before being compatible with the AWS-3 spectrum band.” Apple didn't comment Monday.

The Wireless ISP Association said Public Knowledge is on the right track in recommendations on FCC proposals to expand Part 4 network outage reporting requirements to broadband providers. Replies were due Monday in docket 15-80. PK urged “a reasonable exemption in the short term for small providers not already subject to the Part 4 reporting requirements,” WISPA said. “WISPA appreciates PK’s understanding of the hardships that new outage reporting obligations would place on small broadband providers and its efforts to facilitate discussion about solutions that do not fit the Commission’s ‘one size fits all’ approach,” the group commented. “Although WISPA continues to urge the Commission to exempt small broadband providers from any broadband reporting obligations the Commission may impose, to the extent the Commission nonetheless adopts reporting rules for small providers, it should employ an approach that builds on PK’s recommendations and those of other commenters.” In the initial comment round, expanding Part 4 requirements got general support from states and opposition from industry (see 1608290045).

Auto industry objections to a push for an emergency stay on launch of dedicated short-range communication systems (DSRC) aimed at curbing traffic accidents lack relevancy and swerve around the petition's core argument -- how commercial applications in the 5.9 GHz band negatively affects road safety, consumer privacy, cybersecurity and public interest groups said in reply comments posted Friday in RM-11771. Instead, those opponents to the petition "offer nothing more ... than the same tone-deaf talking points and avoiding the substantive issues at hand," the public interest groups said. The only opponents to the petition are licensees with commercial interests, and many critics don't address the specific privacy and cybersecurity concerns raised in the petition, while consumer and auto safety groups all back it, the public interest groups said. The filers were Public Knowledge, Open Technology Institute at New America, Access Humboldt, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse and Consumer Watchdog. Numerous auto industry groups and allies have pushed for denial of the OTI/PK request (see 1608250051). General Motors in a filing Thursday said the petition is based on "myths grossly exaggerating the security risks posed by DSRC and mischaracterizing the [FCC's] reasoned and long-established rules for the DSRC service." In its reply comments, GM said there are no heightened cybersecurity risks from any backward compatibility mandate in DSRC service rules, and Section 95.1509 of FCC rules -- governing DSRC technical standards -- doesn't preclude future security improvements. It challenged claims that commercial DSRC applications pose a cybersecurity and privacy risk, pointing to IEEE security standards for applications using wireless access in a vehicular environment. Such DSRC applications might include parking management and payment or fuel management, and in each case, consumers will have a choice of whether to share information on an application-by-application basis, GM said, saying its 2017 Cadillac CTS, with DSRC vehicle-to-vehicle communications, won't include any commercial DSRC applications: "There is no need for regulatory action to address a non-existent problem, much less a precipitous 'emergency stay.'"

FCC staff denied CTIA's request to extend a Sept. 26 reply comment deadline in a rulemaking on agency proposals to expand Part 4 communications network outage reporting requirements. CTIA asked for an extra 15 days to respond to "voluminous" initial comments addressing many issues, particularly given its convention during the current reply period, which had only 10 business days (see 1609060024 and 1608290045). But the Public Safety Bureau said it found nothing unusual about the number of comments or complexity of issues to warrant an extension. Its denial order Thursday in docket 15-80 also said the present deadline was needed to ensure timely consideration of proposals for reporting broadband network disruptions that were critical to "public safety and consumer protection concerns."

Qualcomm pushed back at various technical assertions made by critics of rechannelization as a means for sharing the 5.9 GHz band. The resistance came in an FCC filing posted Wednesday in docket 13-49 in response to automaker complaints that rechannelization could slow the deployment of dedicated short-range communication (DSRC) systems designed to curb traffic accidents (see 1607250013). "Enabling such DSRC operations while opening up a portion of the 5.9 GHz DSRC band to Wi-Fi is the essence of the rechannelization plan," Qualcomm said, saying rechannelization wouldn't require all-new DSRC performance testing. Qualcomm also said software changes can allow for rechannelization, obviating any need to redesign DSRC equipment. Rival detect-and-avoid proposal would need extensive testing, and it wouldn't open up wide swaths of spectrum for Wi-Fi operations indoors since DSRC roadside infrastructure and vehicles will prevent Wi-Fi from having meaningful access to the U-NII-4 band inside vehicles, homes and businesses within a several hundred meter radius of those DSRC transmissions, Qualcomm said. It said it agreed simultaneous detection of multiple 10 MHz DSRC channels is feasible, but it also brings "an onerous device and system implementation cost" that would affect rollout of U-NII-4 Wi-Fi devices.