In a radio access network having a first mesh cluster and a second mesh cluster, techniques for enabling an access terminal in a coverage area of the first mesh cluster to maintain a session through a radio node of the first mesh cluster with at least one radio node controller of the second mesh cluster. In a radio access network having a mesh cluster of groups of radio nodes and radio node controllers, techniques for defining a relationship between a pair of groups, the relationship being a neighboring relationship or a non-neighboring relationship, and enabling a radio node of a group to identify a destination radio node controller of a packet received from an access terminal, and to selectively route the packet to a radio node controller based on the relationship between the group of the radio node and the group of the destination radio node controller.