Boone NC Hampton Inn

I'm just making sure this is really a cell panel. Only Carolina West gave a full -035 Rx signal here.

Yuppers, three dual pol antennas in there.

I actually didn't think this was a cell panel, since I've never seen a cellular antenna like this on a building,
but I didn't know what else it could be....how common are these?
And where/why do they usually use these instead of the typical flat sector panels?

The tube-shaped thingy is just a radome that covers three panel antennas that are mounted back-to-back on a thin pole going up the middle. It's a fully sectorized site with three panel antennas that both send and receive - similar to a typical flagpole site.

In the downtown Boone area, I didn't see any panel antennas along hwy 105 or 221.
How many carriers can fit in this radome tube?
Perhaps their using radomes to protect antennas from the wild mountain weather (wind, snow).
I don't know why else they'd use an antenna setup like this. I haven't seen them in the Upstate.

In that particular tube? One.

The radomes server two purposes, one is the weather protection you mentioned and the other is esthetics. While bulky, they do typically encompass the entire structure, both antennas and transmission lines.