The inventive methods and apparatus disclosed herein allocate and assign uplink reference signals to cells (104, 106) within a cell cluster (100, 302, 402, 502) based on the type of cell. According to an embodiment, uplink reference signals are allocated within a cell cluster (100, 102, 302, 402, 502) by partitioning a set of uplink reference signals allocated to the cell cluster (100, 102, 302, 402, 502) into mutually exclusive subsets of uplink reference signals. One of the subsets is allocated to each of the border cells (104) and the entire set of uplink reference signals is allocated to the interior cells (106). Accordingly, more uplink reference signals are available for assignment to mobile devices (310, 410, 510) served by the interior cells (106) than by the border cells (104). In one embodiment, uplink reference signals are statically or semi-dynamically assigned to mobile devices (310, 410, 510) served within the border cells (104) and dynamically assigned to mobile devices (310, 410, 510) served within the interior cells (106).