Sigh. Proposed Tower Dead.

[TWX]

Hey guys,

It's been awhile since my last post on here. Since I first joined WA, you probably have seen me complaining about the lack of Alltel CDMA (now Verizon) service in Rogers City. Since then, I've had AT&T which provided signal in the city, although it was slow EDGE. This past year I've switched to Verizon to use their faster 3G network. Upon signing the contract I knew that they didn't provide great service in the city, but was told afterword there was plans for a 195 foot monopole cell tower.

I was ecstatic. I would actually be able to make a call while in the city. I found the proposed cell site & it had stakes marking the perimeter & even had the backhaul ran to it.

I was told summer 2011 it would be active. I would drive by the location once a week to see if any progress was made, but it was all a waste....they performed soil tests & apparently they came back "contaminated."

So the whole thing is now dead. This has been in the works since 2007 and it came SO close to actually happening.

Now they have to start at square one. Find a suitable location, go through the regulatory process, & perform tests. And years of waiting. Again.

I don't blame Verizon for not wanting to build the tower on contaminated soil. I am just really bummed that this whole project is now nothing. I was really excited to see Verizon finally fill in the huge coverage gap.

I'm going to throw a big party once they have a cell tower in the city.

[Quint101]

Darn!!!! How is the soil contaminated?

[JFB]

That is a bummer.
Is there any chance the land owner could clean it up?

[TWX]

I'm not sure how it's contaminated.

I don't think the landowner is willing to clean it up. When I talked to the Verizon network guy at the store, he told me to start bombarding Verizon's real estate department about new possible locations for the tower. And start from step one

[Airb330]

It could be a variety of sources: PCB's, Petroleum, etc. If it was previously industrial, I could understand, but usually a 'brownfield' is not a surprise. Maybe the soil stability is the issue, once again....this all would be done before backhaul planning, etc. Someone dropped the ball on this one unfortunately.

They could at least put up a temporary site. It could serve some of the town and provide breathing room for the other site that serves the town currently. Does AT&T have a site in the town itself, or just a little closer? Frankly, EDGE on AT&T in this area is just as fast as Verizon or Sprint EVDO at times in southern NJ and DE.

[TWX]

Originally Posted by Airb330 It could be a variety of sources: PCB's, Petroleum, etc. If it was previously industrial, I could understand, but usually a 'brownfield' is not a surprise. Maybe the soil stability is the issue, once again....this all would be done before backhaul planning, etc. Someone dropped the ball on this one unfortunately. They could at least put up a temporary site. It could serve some of the town and provide breathing room for the other site that serves the town currently. Does AT&T have a site in the town itself, or just a little closer? Frankly, EDGE on AT&T in this area is just as fast as Verizon or Sprint EVDO at times in southern NJ and DE.

AT&T does have a site within the town, specifically on the water tower. EDGE here is completely unusable. Verizon 3G is great, usually pull down 1.8-2.3Mbps and .8Mbps up.

I wish they would put up a temporary site. I'll send some emails to the midwest corporate office & see if they will consider.

[TWX]

IT'S ALIVE!!!!

I guess big red ordered more soil samples & they all came back perfect. So the whole project is undead.

In fact, they re-staked the entire area with about 60 stakes w/ labels. I called the land owner and he said they will be done with construction in a month. He also said Verizon is really really pushing the priority to get this cell operational once construction is complete.

[Yankees368]

Hurray! Something sounds fishy there, though.

[TWX]

Originally Posted by Yankees368 Hurray! Something sounds fishy there, though.

Yeah. I'm not sure how the first soil samples were contaminated, but the second set weren't.

I'll drive over to the site tomorrow & take some pictures.

[Yankees368]

Whatever the case is, I hope they get that site up. Verizon has some serious work to do in Michigan.

[TWX]

This is a sad image, but it's as close to the site as I could get. There are a bunch of stakes in the background that doesn't show up in the image. Also, a lot of stakes are surrounding the telephone line access box.

[djjim]

Can you show us where it is on a map?

[TWX]

Originally Posted by djjim Can you show us where it is on a map?

Certainly. The yellow box represents the tower & perimeter. The yellow line indicates approximately where the T1's will be buried.

[music4praise]

Originally Posted by Yankees368 Whatever the case is, I hope they get that site up. Verizon has some serious work to do in Michigan.

Particularly northeastern lower Michigan--of course the upper peninsula is even worse. There are dead spots all over the place.

[TWX]

Just an update. They dug the base last Monday and poured concrete the next day. It set until Friday and then they ran the power and T1's to the tower (underneath the access road). I just saw the crane drive into town a few minutes ago, so I'm not sure if the means they are going to start stacking the monopole today or not. Even though I'm not with VZ anymore, it still is pretty neat to watch the whole project.

The thing that shocked me the most was how much concrete was used in the foundation. I think I counted 9 or 10 big concrete trucks drive to the site.

[TWX]

It looks like they are going to stack the monopole tomorrow. I have the afternoon off tomorrow, so I'll head over to the site then and take some pictures for WA

[TWX]

I just drove by the site a few minutes ago and literally followed the semi hauling the equipment shelter.

[Yankees368]

Damn, they really weren't kidding that they wanted to put that thing up fast. I wonder what lit the fire under Verizons ___ here.

[TWX]

Originally Posted by Yankees368 Damn, they really weren't kidding that they wanted to put that thing up fast. I wonder what lit the fire under Verizons ___ here.

Yeah they are really going to town with this. I'm really happy for all the Verizon customers in Rogers City, they'll actually be able to use their phone now.

On a different note, it looks like AT&T is prepping to put 850Mhz 3G antennas on our new water tower in the next few weeks. So much cellular excitement going on in my little small town lol! On top of that, my AT&T serving cell at home is ready for some new antennas that should be installed by May.

[Yankees368]

I wish there was any cellular development in my area, but the town but a nice stop to that a few years ago.

[Airb330]

Glad the tower is going up fast. As a project manager I can definitely say someone screwed up big time. At least it didn't completely derail the project.

Is there a reason VZ couldn't just be on the water tank like AT&T is? It seems AT&T may have an edge in coverage in your area over Verizon regardless. This is typical Verizon though, have weak service in an area for years on end, people still don't leave them, and finally catch up to AT&T years later. I can't say it's a bad move economically, but I am amazed at how people will put up with terrible Verizon service, but if Sprint or AT&T have problems, they leave.

[markuhde]

It's because Verizon has a good marketing department that knows how to maintain a healthy reality distortion field. People will put up with far worse Verizon service and claim (even believe themselves) that it's "perfect"