Patent ID: 7830795

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: at least one low level media access control (MAC) element (LL-MAC) in a base station of a communication system in which one or more remote units compete for limited uplink resources, each LL-MAC configured to control communication over a respective physical channel between a remote unit and the base station, the at least one LL-MAC including a first LL-MAC configured to control communication over a first physical channel between a first remote unit and the base station; and a high level MAC element (HL-MAC) in the base station, the HL-MAC logically coupled to the at least one LL-MAC and configured to control communication over a plurality of physical channels including the first physical channel, wherein the LL-MAC is configured to send a general bandwidth grant of uplink resources over the first physical channel that can be used by the first remote unit to transmit data-bearing traffic to the LL-MAC, and wherein the LL-MAC is configured to receive in response thereto an explicit bandwidth request message.