Weekend Events

There are two major events this weekend in DC: the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, and the National Capital Barbecue Battle. Both events run Saturday and Sunday. The Folklife Festival is on the Mall, and the Barbecue Battle is on Pennsylvania Avenue between 9th and 14th Streets.

In previous years, the Folklife Festival has used a variety of rented UHF repeaters and simplex frequencies. In 2004, they even used talkgroups on the Smithsonian's LTR Passport system. Here are the frequencies used last year:

461.0750 [ d152] "Program" Channel (R)
461.1250 [ d172] Audio/Visual? (R)
461.2500 [192.8] Brief transmission monitored about weather update
464.9250 [141.3] Administration? (R)

Last weekend, I may have heard the Folklife Festival people setting up. If it was them, they were using some common UHF itinerant frequencies, such as 451.8000, 451.8125, 456.8000, 456.8125, etc.

The Barbecue Battle has also used a variety of rented UHF frequencies over the years. Here's what I found last year:

457.5125 [ d412]
459.4125 [ d743] Logistics?
460.6125 [ d223] Safeway Tent
461.21875 [ d371] Production (Channel 3)
462.3250 [141.3] Security/Medical
462.7125 [ 77.0] Stage Operations?
464.1625 [ d464]
465.8375 [167.9] Gate/Beverage Managers (Channel 2)
467.0125 [225.7]
468.0125 [ d664] Area Managers (Channel 10)

DC Trunked System Talkgroups:
2112 DC Fire Special Events 2
21232 MPD Citywide 2
34448 Department of Health
35536 Emergency Management Agency
35600 Traffic Management Center

In previous years, the event has used the common rental frequencies used by Bearcom Rentals and others (464.5/464.55/464.6/464.625/464.65/464.7/464.725/464.75 and their +5 MHz counterparts).