Towards cross layer mobility support in metropolitan networks

The next generation mobile networks (4G) is expected to integrate a large number of heterogeneous wireless systems. Practically, metropolitan networks will play an important role in such integration since they include a great variety of mobile systems. Mobility management as well as the integration of existing/future wireless technologies remain an important task to be investigated. A number of interworking proposals are available in the literature, yet none can claim to be the ultimate and unique integrated solution. Moreover, these proposals fail to guarantee seamless mobility and service continuity. This paper proposes a one suite integration solution that includes a Hybrid Interworking Architecture (HIA) for metropolitan networks coupled with a cross layer mobility scheme that aims to guarantee seamless roaming through homogeneous and heterogeneous mobile systems within a city coverage. Performance analyses show that our proposals exhibit net improvements of QoS guarantee compared to existing solutions.