16 International Journal of Handheld Computing Research, 4(4), 16-37, October-December 2013

LTE Cellular Network

Planning for Urban Area
Md. Maruf Ahamed, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of North Dakota,
Grand Forks, ND, USA
Zahirul Islam, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of North Dakota, Grand
Forks, ND, USA
Sehtab Hossainand, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of North Dakota,
Grand Forks, ND, USA
Saleh Faruque, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of North Dakota, Grand
Forks, ND, USA

ABSTRACT
Due to the advancement of telecommunication platform, users are now demanding new applications such as
Online Gaming, mobile TV, Web 2.0, and to meet this requirement operators needed to design more lexible
network. To fulill the requirements, 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) works on the Long Term
Evolution (LTE) and propose a system which has larger bandwidths (up to 20 MHz), low latency and packet
optimized radio access technology having peak data rates of 100 Mbps in downlink and 50 Mbps in the uplink
(Magdalena, 2007; Motorola, 2007; Skold, 2009). Offering a greater coverage by providing higher data rates
over wider areas and lexibility of use at existing and new frequency bands plan is a major challenge. In this
paper, we are analyzing practical coverage scenario in an urban area (i.e. Kolkata) in terms of received signal
levels, total noise, interference, throughput, and quality factor for downlink signal level.
Keywords:

Coverage, Downlink Signal Level, Long Term Evolution (LTE), Radio Link Budget, Throughput

1. INTRODUCTION
System specific parameters like, transmit power
of the antennas, their gains, estimate of system
losses, type of antenna system used etc. must
be known prior to the start of wireless cellular
network dimensioning. Each wireless network
has its own set of parameters (Fernandes, 2009).

Traffic analysis gives an estimate of the traffic to be carried by the system. Different types
of traffic that will be carried by the network are
modeled. Traffic types may include voice calls,
VOIP, PS or CS traffic. Overheads carried by
each type of traffic are calculated and included
in the model. Time and amount of traffic is also
forecasted to evaluate the performance of the

DOI: 10.4018/ijhcr.2013100102
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International Journal of Handheld Computing Research, 4(4), 16-37, October-December 2013 17

network and to determine whether the network

can fulfill the requirements set forth. Coverage
estimation is used to determine the coverage
area of each base station.
Coverage estimation calculates the area
where base station can be heard by the users
(receivers). It gives the maximum area that
can be covered by a base station. But it is not
necessary that an acceptable connection (e.g. a
voice call) between the base station and receiver
can be established in coverage area. However,
base station can be detected by the receiver in
coverage area.
Coverage planning includes Radio Link
Budget (RLB) and Coverage analysis (Abdul
Basit, 2009; Jamalipour, Mirchandani, & Kibria, 2005; Md. Masud, Kishore, & Ahamed,
2012). For the planning of any Radio Access
Networks begins with a RLB. RLB comprises
the accounting of all gains and losses from the
transmitter end (Base Station Site), through
the medium (i.e. free space, cable, waveguide,
fiber, etc.) to the receiver end (Mobile Station)
in a Telecommunication System. The maximum
allowed receive signal level at the mobile station
to the base station is estimated which allows
to calculate the maximum path loss allows to
get maximum cell range that leads to estimate
a suitable Propagation Model. According to
the cell range, it allows to estimate the total
number of base station sites required to cover
a required geographical area.

1.

2.
3.

4.

During radio network planning designers

need to consider various factor that will affect
the coverage radius of a cell and the total number
of base station required to cover any particular
area. The key affecting parameters are groups
as the following:
1.
2.
3.

2. RADIO LINK BUDGET

Since operators are rightfully focused on the
service quality of a system, radio network coverage becomes an important part of the service
quality of a system. The main purpose of radio
network planning is to keep balance coverage,
capacity, system quality, and total cost so none
of these can be considered in isolation.
The purpose of Radio Link Budge (RLB)
can be short out as follows (Harri Holma, 2011;
Md. Masud et al., 2012):

Calculate such a factor that can solely

describe building penetration loss, feeder
loss, transmitting antenna gain, and the
interferences;
Calculate the margin of the radio link to
find out all related gains and losses that
can affect the whole cell coverage;
Based on eNodeB transmit power allocation and the maximum transmit power of
the terminal, estimate the maximum link
loss of a radio link;
Whenever estimate the maximum link
loss of a radio link allowed under certain
propagation model, coverage radius of a
base station can be obtained. Then this
radius can be used for subsequent design.

4.
5.

Propagation related parameters, such as

the penetration loss, feeder loss, body loss,
and background noise;
Equipment related parameters, transmit
power, receiver sensitivity, and antenna
gain;
LTE specific parameters, such as Multiple
Input Multiple Output (MIMO) gain, power
boosting gain, edge coverage rate, repeat
coding gain, interference margin, and fast
fading margin;
System Reliability parameters, such as
slow fading margin;
Specific features that will affect the final
path gain.

Note is that the link budget is based on

only theories, and it cannot ensure the system
capacity and coverage reliability of the actual
network. The actual coverage target and requirements also vary with different network

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