Method and apparatus for random access on a wireless communication network

An apparatus comprising:

• a transceiver that
• receives a set of reference signals, where each of the set of reference signals is periodically transmitted by a network entity, and
• receives, via a dedicated radio resource control message, information of a plurality of random access channel preambles and a plurality of reference signals from the set of reference signals;
• and
• a controller coupled to the transceiver, where the controller
• detects at least one reference signal of the plurality of reference signals, and
• selects a reference signal from the detected at least one reference signal,
• wherein the transceiver transmits a random access channel preamble of the plurality of random access channel preambles in a contention-free random access procedure, where the random access channel preamble for transmission is determined based on the selected reference signal.