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NYT on Cell Phone Tower Controversy
prostoalex writes "The New York Times discusses the controversy of placing cell phone towers on top of hills, a practice to which many people object. According to the article, people frequently complain about the visual impediment and are afraid that property values will decline or some health damage will be done with radio waves. At the same time, people get quite irritated when proper phone service is not provided by the operators, and the calls keep dropping or coverage is poor outside of densely populated areas. Phone companies also lease the land to place the cell phone tower for $30,000-$50,000, which is attractive to many landowners, but some, like Sammy Barsa from NYT article, find themselves persona non grata in the community."
As someone who has had a cell phone tower on their property, I think it's a pretty sweet deal. And they aren't really that intrusive anymore, some designs are actually rather low profile, of course those are only meant for rural town coverage, but it's still not so bad.
And the 28,000 we recieve a year is as much as the income of a low-income family.
Please, try not to sound so stupid...
I know cell phone towers are becoming a bane for us amateur astronomers. They are even sprouting up in remote dark sites that were once safe havens from light pollution. At a minimum if the towers would use red instead of white light the problem wouldn't be as bad.
Surely just painting them light blue or white to suit the sky would make them half dissapear. Cheap and easy solution for a non problem.
Oh, and for the record- our TV reception SUCKS.
In Australia, they've started renting space in church steeples. They make the antennae very unobtrusive, and their RF and SONET gear doesn't take up much space. Pumps quite a bit of money into churches that can be used for community projects, aid, missions, etc.
Where I go to college, there is a cellphone antenna array on the top of the tallest building - but you will have to really know what you are looking for to find it... its hidden in a work of art - and looks like part of the building!
Very well hid.
Maybe they should send some of their people to Disney to work in some of the theme parks to discover how Disney makes art. They are damn good at making one thing look like something else. And making it look good.
Even the cable company around here is finally getting into the act and now installing the aboveground workings of their neighborhood distribution electronics in faux fiberglass boulders which blend in with the decor of the neighborhood... those ugly green "breadboxes" they had were an eyesore, graffittied on, and often kicked in disgust. Nobody wanted that ugly thing gracing their front yard.
The thing looked as out of place as an abandoned old car battery.
They need to hire some artists... and use a little creativity so they don't create neighborhood eyesores.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
That you no longer have property rights to do what you please with your property you own. You can't build without a permit, you can't build without getting your plans ok'ed by local zoning boards. You can't develop on your land if it isn't zoned right.
The one thing that retains best value in America and you can't do what you please with it when you own it. Property rights are the biggest thing for a free society, without them you have nothing.
If you had proper property rights for land you own you wouldn't need the EPA becuase you could sue those big companies that polute your land and get the proper restitution for them destroying your land. But perversions in propery rights have made people dependent on the State to receive alimony for damages.
I don't know about elsewhere, but the fake-tree cell phone towers in New York look awful. Yes, we do have real trees, and no, this doesn't look like a tree. It looks like a fucking cell phone tower with a few tiny fake branches at the top. Is it so hard to make it look a little more realistic?
LOAD "SIG",8,1
That's funny.
It reminds me of some of the events that happened in Upstate NY in the last few years. Its a region where the only real employer left is government, and new jobs are supposedly a highly desired commodity to local leaders.
The first was a microprocessor fab, to be built in an existing industrial area and to employ nearly 2,500 skilled people. The objections from the surrounding suburban communities that tipped the county legislature's decision?
Increased traffic.
The second was a concrete plant intended to replace an existing plant that was built during World War 2. The new plant would use newer technologies that would decrease most types of air pollution, but increase particularate matter emmissions slightly; while tripling output and doubling employment.
The construction wasn't approved, after a multi-million dollar advertising campaign... now the existing plant is going to be expanded, which will translate into a net increase in pollution and less new employment.
But some wealthy land speculators won't have their pristine views spoiled! Thank goodness!
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
My family was in a situation with this a few years ago. When I was in college, the town wanted to sell a small plot of land directly behind my neighbors across the street to (I think) Sprint. They wanted to put up a HUGE cell tower to cover the town and the nearby highway. Of course the people for it were those out of sight from the monstrosity or those that would have benefitted financially. It was one of those things where they tried to be quiet about it, and I don't think they even announced that they were going to vote on it.
This thing woud have dwarfed everything around it, houses and the few very short trees. It was a full sized tower you'd see off the Parkway. It would have been right behind their fence and right across the street from our house. We put up flyars showing how tall it was compared to the nearby houses, and it was like 3x taller (perhaps more, I forget).
Such a thing is an eyesore, and I could deal with that. However, big eyesoard drop property values and we consider our house an asset. They plan on moving out in a few years when they retire and obviously don't want their property value plummetting when the have to sell. It's really their one big asset.
It was tough to dissuade the town, they were getting money and were explaining how much better our cell coverage would be. That was a laugh as the coverage in town was already damn good (full bars on Verizon and AT&T at the time). So big deal, the town gets another ~50k a year and our [b]already great[/b] cell coverage would have gotten an iota better.
I can't blame individuals for wanting to do it, especially if they need the money. But for our town to want to do it for what would have been (let's face it) a small amount for a well-off town was rediculous.
I find the negative view of windfarms odd. They're beautiful things. You drive down a grassy road and you see hundreds of these giant rotating blades slowly spinning in the wind. The whole experience is a bit surreal, like passing into a 60's music video. These giants are there, always moving but never going anywhere. The constant, rhythmic flow of motion is quite nice juxtaposed against the quick, jerky motion of modern living. No matter how many times I drive by the windfarm on the way to Sacramento, I always enjoy the experience.
Water towers are the same. They're big, surreal bulbs cropping out of tree lines. They ground an area and let you know where you are, and where you are going. They're like the biggest tree in the forest. I've always thought of them as quite pretty.
The ______ Agenda
[rant voice="farmboy"]
If you want Beverly Hills, stay in B.H. Don't all move out to the country together, then try to make it into B.H. -- all that does is destroy the rural character that made it an attractive place to live in the first place.
In fact, we LIKE our local trailer trash and their junkyard, because hopefully they'll make it look bad to B.H. types, so they'll go build their fancy custom homes somewhere else, where they won't negatively impact OUR rural lifestyle.
The problem with "neighbour control" is that it tends to snowball. Today you can't have a pig farm, tomorrow you can't have horses or put up a barn, next year you're required to landscape your property with N-many trees and X-much lawn (do they offer to pay your increased water bills? hell no!), and the year after that you're forced to ALWAYS keep your non-running car in the garage (don't have a garage? Tough, you may be required to build one.) Yes, ALL of these are realworld scenarios I've either actually encountered, or have seen proposed.
Most bizarre case I've seen, even the colour of your MAILBOX was controlled. And this was clear out in the boonies, as Los Angeles County goes, with exactly ONE neighbour in sight.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
I do like the idea of wind farms in gerneral, but I also see that there might be a problem with having one in your back yard.
As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)