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In October, NSRC installed the first AREDN node in the Chicago Amateur Radio Emergency Data Network at the Park Tower repeater location. It is currently being tested for use in public service events, and various other applications.

The current services hosted are a website, a dynamically updating mesh map, a PBX (phone) server, and iperf3 utilities for testing speeds. More are planned for deployment, and anyone that adds a node to the network can serve their own services on the mesh. All part 97 requirements still apply. Plans are being discussed for a second node 16 miles to the north for a longer distance test and to extend the range of this high speed, high bandwidth, part 97, self healing mesh network. The network is available and open for public use. The Park Tower node located at roughly 520' AGL at 41°58'49"N 87°39'17"W, is on AREDN channel 177, with a 10MHz channel width. The antenna is a 120 degree sector antenna aimed at roughly 300 degrees, and should therefore cover from O'Hare to the lakefront. AREDN, being in the 5GHz band, requires perfect line of site to the node for connection, and has a range of around many many miles. Links of greater than 7 miles have been successfully tested, and that testing is ongoing. Licensed users are welcome to connect up and take it for a spin. Anyone looking for help calculating a link, with device selection, or just generally interested, feel free to reach out to Casey Diers, KV3T, via his contact information listed on QRZ.