In the Basque country of northern Spain, TETRA operator Itelazpi is extending its network to serve the Metro system of the city of Bilbao, replacing an existing TETRA infrastructure there.

The Biscay Transport Consortium (CTB in Spanish) – which includes Bilbao Metro as service operator, Euskal Trenbide Sarea (ETS) as transport infrastructure management company and EuskoTren as multi-line service operator – has signed an agreement with Itelazpi, the Basque Government TETRA communications service provider. Under this agreement, the Metro will use a Teltronic TETRA infrastructure supplied by Teltronic and Grupo CYS.

Bilbao Metro will replace its existing TETRA installation with Teltronic’s latest-generation Nebula infrastructure, which is already used by Itelazpi to provide coverage across the whole of the Basque Country. This will be extended further during 2011 to include the railway’s underground sections.

Besides Bilbao Metro, the Itelazpi network’s customers include a number of Basque Country government entities, ambulance services, local councils and municipal water companies.

Itelazpi’s TETRA network, which provides wide-area shared radio coverage for Basque public bodies and institutions is made up of 137 base stations deployed across the whole of the Basque country. With the rollout to Bilbao’s underground system, it will grow to 161 base stations by the end of 2011. Features for users include a variety of voice and data services – for example, automatic vehicle and person location, telemetry, remote resources management and database access from the radio terminal.