Planning of Relay Station Locations in IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX) Networks

Broadband wireless access networks have received a tremendous amount of research and development in the recent years. There have also been pilot networks deployed in many cities around the globe. In the IEEE 802.16j standard, Relay Stations (RS) play a promising role of extending the range of a Base Station (BS). This architecture is suitable to areas with limited infrastructure, such as rural areas, since it is difficult to install many BSs, with each having a wired connection. In this paper, we present an optimization model that finds the number of RSs and their locations to serve a customer base. We also show how our model can be adapted to make the planning in real-life scenarios where there are obstacles, such as mountains and lakes, in the planning area.