What Monterey CHP Dispatch Looked Like

That was then.....
...and this is now!

I haven't been able to find out who this dispatcher was, but believe me, that's my Comm Center back in the "old days." Until the early '80s, the dispatchers worked with only slightly newer equipment in the SAME room as in this picture. Dispatch wasn't moved into its own building until 1984. They simply enclosed a portion of the carport and moved the radio consoles, phones and dispatchers out there.

This picture shows the original small room directly adjacent to the receptionist's desk by the front door of the Area Office; the Comm Center, at the back of the building, has its own phone system, small kitchenette, a uni-sex rest room, and totally separate heating and air-conditioning unit. We're our own entity, sort of...

Although we're sitting on concrete slab, we don't need a raised floor for the CAD system because we remotely access another one of our Comm Centers' CAD systems.

We actually access the CAD system through phone lines and a 56K modem!

But at least we don't have to use the form on which this dispatcher is writing -- at least not on a regular basis. You see, that form still exists -- is still being printed -- because we use it for special events at remote venues to log incident radio traffic.

It's called a Radio Station Log, CHP 122, and I have several pads of that exact form in a file cabinet at work. (The last revision date was 1991.)