Design of an urban point-to-multipoint millimetric radio system with a two level hierarchy

The design of a flexible urban point-to-multipoint (P-MP) network architecture is proposed. A two level hierarchical cellular structure is introduced that takes advantage of propagation conditions in two recently opened millimetric frequency bands. This leads to improvements over existing systems that employ single size cells. The proposed network judiciously deploys large and small cells and different uplink/downlink frequency pairs in a sector. This increases flexibility in deployment and improves reconfigurability to changing subscriber demands. It also provides a means of controlling congestion. As a result, decreased bandwidth requirement per uplink/downlink pair may be achieved. Consequently power requirements on the radio hardware are reduced. Alternatively the extra power can be used to combat the commonly experienced problem of rain fading