Comments Sought on Plans to Broadcast Pre-Operational L2C and L5 Civil Navigation (CNAV) Messages

A Federal Register Notice (FRN) has been published to seek comment from the public and industry regarding plans by the United States Air Force to broadcast pre-operational L2C and L5 civil navigation (CNAV) messages from certain Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites beginning in April 2014. Please reach out to your stakeholders to ensure they are aware of this FRN and the deadline for comments if they would like to provide input. You will find the FRN at the following link:
 
https://federalregister.gov/a/2014-04856
    
The Department of Transportation seeks comments on: (a) The benefits, risks, or issues to users from this plan, including comments on the appropriate timeline for broadcasting pre-operational CNAV messages. Comments are requested from industry on: (b) the receiver development benefits and other intended uses of pre-operational signals, and (c) the benefits and potential impacts to users of continuous pre-operational CNAV messages with L2C and L5 signals set healthy.

These CNAV messages will be formatted in accordance with Interface Specifications IS-GPS-200G and IS-GPS-705C, each dated 31 Jan 2013. However, a pre-operational signal means the availability and other characteristics of the broadcast signal may not comply with all requirements of the relevant Interface Specifications and should be employed at the users’ own risk.

Please note that the comment period closes on April 4th.