The FCC will accept public comments in response to a July FCC Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) in WT Docket 16-239 — the “Symbol Rate” proceeding — until October 11. Reply comments — ie, comments on comments already filed — are due by November 10. The NPRM now has been published in The Federal Register, thus opening the respective 60-day and 30-day comment/reply comment windows.

In response to a 2013 ARRL Petition for Rule Making (RM-11708), the FCC proposed to revise the Amateur Service Part 97 rules to eliminate current baud rate limitations for data emissions, consistent with ARRL’s Petition, but it declined to propose a bandwidth limitation for data emissions in the MF and HF bands to replace the baud rate limitations. ARRL had asked the FCC to change the Part 97 rules to delete the symbol rate limits in §97.307(f) and replace them with a maximum bandwidth for data emissions of 2.8 kHz on amateur frequencies below 29.7 MHz.

Interested parties may comment on the NPRM in WT Docket 16-239 via the FCC’s Electronic Comment Filing Service (EFCS), as well as by mail.