A method of multiple access.

A low delay multiple access scheme called Shared Time-Division Duplexing (STDD), allows both uplink and downlink voice traffic to share a common channel. The scheme contains separate uplink and downlink control channels and a common voice information channel. The control channels comprise means for signalling voice requirements and acknowledgements of the time slot allocation. Using speech activity detection only, talk spurt speech packets are generated for transmission. STDD dynamically allocates time slots in the common information channel taking advantage of co-ordinated two-way conversations to achieve high statistical multiplexing gain and more efficient realization of the common information channel.