Method and apparatus for a radiotelephone system optimized for cell boundary coverage reliability

A radiotelephone network comprising a mobile switching center;

• an optimized cell encompassing a geographic area with a cell boundary, said network having a predetermined RF reliability along said cell boundary;
• said cell has a radius R determined from a minimized number N of received data indicating received power level and location data representative of a received signal transmitted from a transmitter within the cell and received within a traversed geographic region where the traversed geographic region is minimized, wherein said radius R is calculated from coefficients A' and B, a fade margin FM.sub..sigma., and a minimum acceptable signal strength threshold P.sub.THRESH, said coefficients A' and B being coefficients for an equation P.sub.r =A'-Br.sub.L, wherein P.sub.r is the measured received power for a given location a distance r from said transmitter and r.sub.L is log.sub.10 r, said fade margin FM.sub..sigma. being based on a predetermined target reliability figure F(z) and an estimated standard deviation .sigma. of lognormal fading for said received data.