Why do police officers have such massive walkie-talkies?

because it is not only a “walkie-talkie” but its a scanner, and they need far range in unique situations.

Just my guess…

And it’s too expensive to buy new ones. :-)

They want to save money…

For donuts…

Once I saw a cop eating lunch and he was listening to the radio (as in music) with his walkie talkie. I guess they pick up everything!

It’s usually a combination of budget and durability. Since there are often compatibility issues between older and newer models, the department would have to update everyone at once, and there usually isn’t room in the budget (donuts are usually paid for by the cops, not the taxpayers). Smaller radios also usually aren’t as durable. Cops on patrol sit on their radios, bang them getting in and out of cars, going through doorways, moving at their desk, etc.

the two largest components of any radio (which is all a walkie talkie really is) are the amplifier and the battery. police radios have an extremely beefy amp so as to maximize their range (maximum distance from source of radio signal) and extremely beefy batteries so they don’t have to worry about running out of juice before the end of the shift.

MONEY $$$... no one ever wants to give more money in the budget for upgrades in equipment for police officers. Believe it or not in most major cities the only revenue generating departments are the Water/Sewer Departments and Law Enforcement. Every other department including Fire, EMS, Garbage collection and all other paper pushing positions suck money out but rarely bring it in.

There are some very new, effective, and more efficient radios on the market now, when purchased in bulk can be a very effective way of not only giving the officer the contact he/she needs in case of an emergency but also AVL/GPS to find them in case of emergency or if you have a d*ckhead boss who just wants to follow your every move.

Some departments spend more money hunting down pieces and parts of the old radios and fixing the junk ones they have when it would be cheaper and “safer” for the officer to get the new ones.

I guess “safer” isn’t in the minds of most people. I understand most people hate cops because they give them tickets or tell them what to do. Police officers take an oath to uphold the law and enforce the laws no matter how petty you think it is. YOUR politicians put them into place, the police don’t just make them up for your inconvenience. Yes, complain to City Hall or City Counsel about how stupid you think the law is. It is dereliction of duty for an officer to ignore you throwing that piece of paper on the ground (littering) in your beautiful town. So you need to pick what side of the fence you want to be on. Law abiding and supporting the police for doing what you know is right and what you do because you are law abiding… or deceitful, law ignoring and could give two poops less person that contributes to the break down of our beautiful country.

Police are homeland military and without them you would not be able to go into a store, buy something and get it home with having it taken away by a scavenger.

Back to the radio issue, In this case SIZE does not matter!!! ;)

Oh and Police radios don’t usually tune into AM/FM stations they are on a different band (usually 800 mhz) which will not receive those stations.