Cities are looking for additional revenue from cell antenna sites. Up to 25% of urban households now only have cell phones – not land lines. Over half of the population currently have smart phones such as iPhones.  Unfortunately, the cell providers often find that the process of placing cell antennas on city property or city structures such as light and power poles takes a prohibitively long time.  Dealing with condominiums can be just as time consuming.  Cell tower lease consultants know that it is easier to place cell sites on private lands where it is only necessary to get the approval of one landlord.

A major difficulty when attempting top put up a new cell tower on on city lands is local politics. The city may approve an installation but as soon as local (NIMBY) residents get involved with placards and news media – the city then often backs down.   The same problem happens when approaching a condominium or strata complex for new cell towers – a small group of residents will react to the proposed cell antenna installation an emotional rather than rational response.

If cell towers are less than 15 meters in height, no permitting or consultation is required. Even towers more than 15 meters are only required to have one public hearing – generally facilitated by the cell carrier – that has no binding authority to do anything. Industry Canada has the final say and rarely denies the placement of any telecom antennas.

The concerns that the condominium complex or public organizations have about entering into a 20 year contract with a telecom are often valid, but these concerns can often be effectively handled with a properly worded contract that protects the interests of all parties.  For example, the ‘template’ contracts we usually see presented to clients by Telus, Rogers and Bell contain no wording about providing the site owners with copies of the Safety Code 6 test for the site each time a new antenna is added or the power and/or direction of an antenna is altered.  This can create huge liability for the property owners if non-telecom workers (such as HVAC) are exposed to RF Radiation in levels that exceed the limits set out in Safety Code 6.

Unfortunately while Industry Canada is supposed to govern over the telecoms, our experience with representatives of Industry Canada has shown that they are reluctant to get involved. For example, we recently had a property owner with a 20+ meter tower repeatedly request a Safety Code 6 test from Rogers.  After months of requesting a report showing each antennas and certification that the entire antenna site tested as safe under Safety Code 6, the owners received a 1 page ‘compliance letter’ from a Rogers engineer that had seemingly had never visited the site.  When the local Industry Canada office was contacted, they did nothing.

Email from Medallion Land Services RE: Refusal of Safety Code 6 request

When Antenna Management works with cities, condominiums, or other organizations to advise on and negotiate the terms of  new cell towers, we supply the group we are working for with a contract that has been developed with large organizations in mind, and we customize the contract to fit the specific needs and concerns of the group.  We always try to be fair and consistent with both sides, and end up with a contract that is fair for both sides but not so onerous that the telecom seeks to erect their new cell antenna installation elsewhere.

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Cities like Saskatoon and Regina has seen tremendous growth in cell antenna demand.  Telecom experts report that to 10% of homes in Saskatchewan  now only use cell phones – not land lines. Currently 42 cell sites are operating in Saskatoon – all with multiple antennas according to cell antenna lease experts.

Many Saskatchewan cities like Regina and Saskatoon have cell services provided by SaskTel and Rogers. Cities are looking for additional revenue from cell antenna sites. Unfortunately, the cell providers find that the process of placing cell antennas on city property or city structures such as light and power poles takes a long time. Cell tower lease consultants know that it is easier to place cell sites on private lands (only the owner to deal with) and no city consultation is needed. Cell tower lease consultants advise Rogers and Sasktel to avoid public properties for antenna placement.

Another difficulty in dealing with cities is local politics. The city may approve an installation but as soon as local (NIMBY) residents get involved with placards and news media – the city usually backs down. Rogers and Sasktel know this and generally don’t bother with public sites.

Cell Tower Lease Experts find City Properties Frustrating

As the article states, if cell towers are less than 15 meters in height, no permitting or consultation is required. Even towers more than 15 meters are only required to have one public hearing – generally run by Rogers or Sasktel – that has no binding authority to do anything. Industry Canada has the final say and rarely denies the placement of any telecom antennas.

Cities do have several other areas of influence that are often ignored. To start, if the equipment is to be hooked up to the city power grid then permits and approvals are required. Towers attract lightning but may not be annually certified for grounding. Cities may forget to ask for Safety Code 6 reports every time antenna or power level changes are made. Cities don’t know if installations are kept Safety Code 6 compliant over time.  If towers are on city lands and cannot be proven safe, cities may be liable if named in class actions from local residents, regardless of actual harm done.

Below an article by CTV Saskatoon on a recent concern by the city for consultation about cell towers.  The city has developed a consultation process but may not have any teeth to enforce it because local cell antenna fall under the federal telecommunications act:

A cellphone tower can be an eyesore – that’s why a new policy has been approved to include more public consultation about where new towers are set to go up.

The new policy will allow public consultation for cellular towers that are less than 15 meters tall.

The policy change comes after residents complained to city council after a tower went up in Caswell Hill.

The City of Saskatoon will now consult the public on cell towers less than 15 meters tall.

“We didn’t realize what was going in there until it was already up,” said Bob Challis, Caswell Hill resident. “It’s pretty bad. We have a nice little neighborhood and it’s kind of an eyesore,” he added.

The neighborhood complained about the lack of consultation with the community regarding the tower.

The city’s previous policy was that no consultation was necessary for towers less than 15 meters, but now there will be a clear process for residents to voice their concerns.

The City of Saskatoon doesn’t have the authority to approve or reject cell phone tower construction – the federal minister of industry does – but the city does oversee public consultations and delivers a report to the minister.

Now those consultations will include shorter cell towers.

“If there is a tremendous amount of opposition we accompany that information with a letter from the city saying we do not concur with that location,” said Alan Wallace, the manager for the city’s planning and development branch.

According to Sasktel, between 5 and ten per cent of homes in Saskatoon don’t use landlines anymore and simply rely on wireless devices.

Wireless data usage is growing at a rate of 5 per cent a week, meaning new towers are necessary to providing service.

To view the original CTV article, click here.

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Why is there such a growth in the need for cell phone towers?  Consider this:

Consider an old fashioned cell phone that is only being used for a phone call or sending a text messages as 1 unit of bandwidth.

You may be surprised that the smart phone that is so difficult to pry out of a teenager’s hands uses up 30 times as many units of bandwidth.

An iPad or other tablet computer being used to watch a video on YouTube uses up an astounding 1,300 times as much much bandwidth as the old cell phones that were considered ‘standard” a decade ago.

The cell companies face the challenge of getting their cell antennas close enough to their customers while maintaining good relations with the public.

With an increasingly large segment of the population having no land lines in their residences, it could be argued that having good cell antennas coverage in a residential community actually enhances public safety.

It is also important to remember to carefully review the sources of cell antenna safety information.

Below is a video by CBC discussing cell antennas in residential neighbourhoods:

Cell Tower Regulations Frustrate Homeowners

Towers under 15 metres tall avoid municipal scrutiny

by By Angela Gilbert, CBC News
to view original article on CBC website, please click here.

Homeowners across Canada are discovering  towers popping up in residential neighbourhoods that slip just under height regulations that would require the company to notify those living nearby.

Oakville, Ont., resident Lisa Guglietti was in the midst of building her dream home when the mother of three noticed eight cellular network antennas strapped to the chimney of a Bell Canada building, a short distance from her son’s bedroom.

“We were surprised that we weren’t notified,” she said. “We asked some of the neighbours. None of the neighbours had any clue that these cellular antenna had been put up.”

Under federal regulations, cell phone companies must notify the municipality for towers at least 15 metres high, but many new installations are coming up short of the limit, at just 14.9 metres. Homeowners say the rule undermines their ability to weigh in on installations in the community.

Though the antennas are an eyesore, Guglietti’s primary concern is possible health effects.

Experts disagree on the impact caused by cell towers. The International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies radiofrequency electromagnetic fields, which are emitted by wireless phones and cell towers, as a possible human carcinogen.

Health Canada states that radiofrequency fields given off by cell phone towers are safe as long as the facility adheres to federal regulatory requirements limiting human exposure.

In an email to CBC News, a Bell spokesperson wrote that all its sites, including the Oakville, Ont., one near Guglietti’s house, “meet or exceed all federal safety and other operating requirements.”

City Councillor struggles with Cell Antenna Issue
In June, construction began on a 14.9-metre cell phone tower in a Barrie, Ont. neighbourhood that triggered a backlash over potential health concerns for those living across the street and students walking to nearby schools.

“Telecommunications companies are able to come in and put these things basically wherever they want: as close to any residents, as close to any schools, and as close to any community centre they want,” Barrie, Ont. city councillor John Brassard told CBC News.

“Why not make it 14.99 metres?” he asked.

Since the incident, the Barrie city councillor has begun working to change federal regulations to give Canadians a voice over the placement of cell towers in their neighbourhoods.

“Authority and a large part of that decision making should be made by the municipality and in consultation with Industry Canada. Not just Industry Canada alone.”

Government, company response
CBC News requested government data on the number of towers under 15 metres erected across Canada, but Industry Canada said the department doesn’t keep a database of that information.

In the last year, Ottawa has collected about $582 million in revenue from telecommunications companies rolling out their networks of cell towers.

Industry Canada told CBC News that companies are required to consult with the municipality and public before installing antenna towers, unless the towers fall within a certain height.

“Certain installations, including towers less than 15 metres, generally have minimal local impact and so may be excluded from municipal consultation,” an Industry Canada spokesperson said in a written statement to CBC News.

After discovering the cell antennas on the large brick building next door to her new house, Guglietti contacted the federal agency.

An Industry Canada official responded in an email to Guglietti on June 8, 2012 that “given that the installation at the Bell central office building on Balsam Street complies with all procedural and technical requirements, Industry Canada is not in a position to order Bell to relocate the facility.”

Cell tower antennas were strapped to a chimney that was 13 metres away from the bedroom of Lisa Guglietti’s son.
Guglietti also contacted Bell Canada, which owns the building next door, and says she was initially told it would try to find an alternative location. However, the eight cell antennas remain attached to the chimney next door.

‘Don’t want to be a guinea pig’
The scientific uncertainty over the health impact of cell phone towers doesn’t sit well with Guglietti.

“I’m supposed to be OK with that?” asked Guglietti. “I’m supposed to have my son exposed to these frequencies day in and day out and I have to wait. Maybe in 10 years from now I’m going to find out, ‘Oh yeah there is, there can be health hazards in living so close to a cell tower.’ “

“I don’t want to be a guinea pig,” said Guglietti.

A Bell spokesperson said in an email to CBC News that cell phone towers are being installed to meet customer demand.

Guglietti said she’s certain other homeowners are dealing with similar concerns.

If you have any information on this story, or other cell phone tower stories, please contact us at investigations@cbc.ca.

“I need to protect myself and I need to protect my family. I’m a mother and I’m sure anyone would do the same thing in our situation.”

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The above video by CBC shows some examples of church cell antenna towers.

Many churches benefit from the income that cell antennas can provide. With the growth of popularity of tablet computers such as iPads and Smart phones, the cell companies are finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with demand for bandwidth in residential neighborhoods. Church cell antenna towers can benefit the congregation and the neighbourhood.

With a properly structured contract, churches and cell antenna companies can establish long-term mutually beneficial relationships that can strengthen the community.

Click here to see the original article source.

Churches across Canada are erecting massive cellphone towers on their properties as cash-strapped congregations help feed the country’s insatiable desire for cellular coverage, CBC’s John Lancaster reports.

Dartmouth, N.S., Port Sandfield, Ont., Mississauga, Ont., and Calgary are among the communities that have seen the huge towers erected on church property — sometimes disguised as crosses.

At Deer Park United Church in Calgary, Rev. Tom Melvin says the tower there brings in thousands of dollars.

The “lease is $20,000 a year, five-year contract that’s renewable, with a 20 per cent escalator every time it’s renewed,” he says.

Church cell towers have sparked debate in some communities over perceived health concerns or the devaluing of nearby properties.

In Mississauga, Ont., a gleaming white tower disguised as a cross soars 30 metres into the air, dwarfing the tiny church below.

Mississauga Coun. Pat Mullin says she’s seen enough.

“My problem is how many more are going to be parachuted in? This is a residential community, you can see what an eyesore that is. These are huge.”

Bernard Lord, president and CEO of the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association, says it’s a case of supply and demand.

“Canadians consume more data, voice and text than virtually any other place in the world,” says Lord, a former premier of New Brunswick. “We want that to continue. We want Canada to be at the leading edge of the mobile digital economy, not laggers.”

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One of China’s largest telecom companies is setting up shop in Canada to capitalize on the flourishing trade relationship between the two countries.

China Unicom announced Tuesday that it has opened an office in Toronto as it embarks on the latest leg of its North American expansion. The Beijing-based company, which operates a global network that covers more than 240 countries, said Canada is a key growth market along with the United States and the Asia-Pacific region.

The company, which booked annual revenues of $33-billion (U.S.) last year, said its goal is to function as a communications “gateway” to Asia. It will provide network backbone support to help Canadian telcos connect to China, while also providing telecom services to Canadian companies expanding to China and to Chinese businesses establishing operations in Canada. Those enterprise clients include financial institutions, executives said.

“Our sole mission and unwavering force of our Toronto operations will be to support the global network infrastructure requirements of our Canadian clients,” said Yitao Wu, president of China Unicom (Americas) Operations Ltd., during a ribbon-cutting ceremony at a Toronto hotel.

China Unicom is pursuing its Canadian expansion at a time of thriving Sino-Canadian relations. China is already Canada’s second-largest merchandise trading partner. In 2011, Canadian exports to China totalled nearly $17-billion, while imports from China totalled $48.1-billion. Prime Minister Stephen Harper led a trade mission to China this year to forge even deeper economic ties.

That budding bilateral relationship, plus Canada’s relatively resilient economy, provided strong incentives for China Unicom to add Toronto to its global footprint, said Mr. Wu. “There are many, many Chinese companies that are coming here, so they need telecom services because they want to expand their business,” he said in an interview.

The company’s Canadian telecom partners include BCE Inc., Telus Corp., Rogers Communications Inc. and Manitoba Telecom Services Inc., added Mr. Wu. Internationally, China Unicom has partnership agreements with over 100 carriers.

In addition to vast global submarine cable systems, China Unicom also operates a terrestrial network that connects Europe to Asia. Within China, the company’s network covers more than 600 cities and includes 320 million subscribers for its wireline and mobile services.

Nonetheless, its North American ambitions are limited to providing wireline services. Although Mr. Wu made it a point to boast that China Unicom has the largest iPhone user base outside the United States, he said the company has no plans to enter the wireless market in either the U.S. or Canada.

“The market is too competitive,” he said, noting that wireless incumbents already have a lock on the mobile market in both countries. Building a new wireless network in Canada would require “a lot of investment,” he added.

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TeraGo Inc. is embarking on a strategic review to examine a range of options, including an outright sale, now that Ottawa has lifted foreign investment restrictions for small telecom companies.

The Thornhill, Ontario based company, which provides wireless broadband, data and voice services to small and medium-sized businesses in 46 Canadian markets, said Wednesday its board of directors has formed a special committee to shepherd the review process.

It has also hired U.S. investment bank Houlihan Lokey and Canadian-based Canaccord Genuity as financial advisers – moves that whet the appetite of investors for more mergers-and-aquisition activity in the telecom sector.

United States based Primus Telecommunications Group Inc. announced a deal in August to take full control of Canadian-based Globility Communications Corp. Meanwhile, Manitoba Telecom Services Inc. has hired investment bankers in Canada and the United States to drum up interest in its MTS Allstream division, according to sources.

There is also speculation that Globalive Wireless Management Corp., which operates under the Wind Mobile name, could also be in play now that its financial backer, Amsterdam-based VimpelCom Ltd., faces no foreign-investment obstacle to launch a formal takeover. (There are also suggestions that Globalive could pursue a potential merger with Mobilicity or a regional cable company like Quebecor’s Vidéotron Ltée.)

TeraGo’s announcement, however, has been widely anticipated for months. As a result, the company’s shares increased by 9.5 per cent, or 95 cents, to close at $10.95 on the Toronto Stock Exchange – gains that give the company a market cap of roughly $123.9-million.

“There can be no assurance that the strategic review process will result in any change in the operation or ownership of the Company and TeraGo does not intend to make any further announcements with respect to its strategic review until such time as it deems appropriate,” the company said.

In June, chief executive officer Bryan Boyd told The Globe and Mail that TeraGo would be open to considering a variety of strategic options, including a possible sale or joint venture, once new foreign investment rules took effect. The legislation, which allows for 100-per-cent foreign ownership of telcos with a market share of 10 per cent or less, received royal assent earlier this summer.

“As soon as these laws are changed, one of the very first things we will do is to increase our awareness in these other markets outside of Canada so that we can attract new investors and just raise the profile of the company. Steps beyond that – joint ventures, interest from foreign players in buying the company – we can’t control these things, but these are all possibilities, for sure,” Mr. Boyd said in an interview at the time.

Analysts have already suggested that U.S. companies like Towerstream Corp. and Airband Communications Inc. could be potential buyers, given that both have similar business models to TeraGo.

But Greg MacDonald, an analyst with Macquarie Capital Markets Canada Ltd., said TeraGo could also generate interest here at home. “Within Canada we suggest cablecos could be interested in owning or partnering with a company like TeraGo,” he wrote in a note to clients.

Mr. MacDonald has long suggested that Rogers and Cogeco could be logical acquirers given that both have been eager to gain a bigger share of the small and medium-sized business market – a customer segment that is providing a new growth opportunity for cable companies.

In his note on Wednesday, Mr. MacDonald said that “precedent deals” such as Cogeco’s acquisition of MTO Telecom or QuietTouch or Rogers’s purchase of Atria could value TeraGo at $16 to $19 a share based on 2013 estimates.

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In Race For Better Cell Service, Men Who Climb Cellular Towers Pay With Their Lives

By Ryan Knutson and Liz Day, PBS Frontline and ProPublica

Between 2003 and 2011, 50 climbers died working on cellular antennas in U.S.

In the spring of 2008, AT&T was racing to roll out a new cell phone network to deliver music, video and online games at faster speeds.

The network, known as 3G, was crucial to the company’s fortunes. AT&T’s cell service had been criticized by customers for its propensity to drop calls, a problem compounded when the company became the sole carrier for the iPhone.

Jay Guilford was a tiny but vital cog in the carrier’s plans.

On a clear evening in May, Guilford was dangling, 150 feet in the air, from a cell tower in southwest Indiana. He had been sent aloft to take pictures of AT&T antennas soon to be replaced by 3G equipment.

Work complete, Guilford sped his descent by rappelling on a rope. Safety standards required him to step down the metal pole, peg by peg, using a special line that would catch automatically if he fell. But tower climbing is a field in which such rules are routinely ignored.

“Bouncy, bouncy,” Guilford, 25, called jovially to men on the ground.

Then, in an instant, the hook attaching the rope to the tower 2013 broken and missing its safety latch 2013 came loose. Guilford plummeted to the gravel below, landing feet first. The impact shattered his legs and burst his aorta. He bled to death in minutes.

Cell phones are our era’s ubiquitous technology device. There are more active cell phones in the U.S. than people.

An investigation by ProPublica and PBS “Frontline” shows that the convenience of mobile phones has come at a hefty price: Between 2003 and 2011, 50 climbers died working on cell sites, more than half of the nearly 100 who were killed on communications towers.

Yet cell phone carriers’ connection to tower climbing deaths has remained invisible. They outsource this dangerous work to subcontractors, a practice increasingly common in risky businesses from coal mining to trucking to nuclear waste removal. If you look up the major cell carriers in the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s database of workplace accident investigations, you will not find a single tower climber fatality listed.

Guilford didn’t work for AT&T 2013 he worked for a subcontracting outfit affiliated with a bigger subcontractor hired by a construction management firm working for AT&T.

For each tower-related fatality since 2003, ProPublica and PBS “Frontline” traced the contracting chain from bottom to top, reviewing thousands of pages of government records and interviewing climbers, industry executives and labor experts.

We found that in accident after accident, deadly missteps often resulted because climbers were shoddily equipped or received little training before being sent up hundreds of feet. To satisfy demands from carriers or large contractors, tower hands sometimes worked overnight or in dangerous conditions.

One carrier, AT&T, had more fatalities on its jobs than its three closest competitors combined, our reporting revealed. Fifteen climbers died on jobs for AT&T since 2003. Over the same period, five climbers died on T-Mobile jobs, two died on Verizon jobs and one died on a job for Sprint.

The death toll peaked between 2006 and 2008, as AT&T merged its network with Cingular’s and scrambled to handle traffic generated by the iPhone. Eleven climbers died on AT&T jobs in those three years, including Guilford.

“I don’t think there’s any question that the pressure to build out the network has been a contributing factor to fatalities,” said Steve Watts, who worked as a risk manager at AT&T until 2007.

Current AT&T officials would not comment on the Guilford case and declined requests to be interviewed for this story, as did officials at the other major cell carriers.

In a written statement, AT&T said it required its contractors to follow safety regulations and that cell tower fatalities had decreased in recent years even as carriers have continued to make expensive improvements to their wireless networks. There were no fatalities on AT&T jobs last year, the statement noted.

“Worker safety has always been a hallmark of AT&T,” the statement said.

The carrier and its construction management firm, General Dynamics, had no employees on site when Guilford died 2013 only subcontractors. Neither was sanctioned in OSHA’s investigation after the accident.

OSHA cited just one company for safety violations in the case: Nashville-based Phoenix of Tennessee, the parent company of All Around Towers, the subcontractor that had managed the climbing crew. Inspectors concluded that Phoenix of Tennessee had not removed broken equipment from the site or addressed unsafe work conditions in plain view. The company paid a fine of $2,500.

All Around Towers went out of business soon after the accident. Two of its owners, who started a new tower company called ETA Systems, declined to answer questions from ProPublica and PBS “Frontline.”

Kyle Waites, the owner of Phoenix of Tennessee and part-owner of All Around Towers, said he sent climbers for retraining and purchased new safety equipment after Guilford’s fall.

“Do I feel responsible to a degree? I think everybody does that was involved with it,” Waites said. “What caused Jay’s death was a chain of events that all could have, and should have, been prevented.”

But Waites said that those off site, like himself, could only do so much to ensure climbers’ safety 2013 it had been up to All Around Towers, and Guilford himself, to follow the rules.

“Once you leave men alone, the men have to police themselves,” he said.

Guilford left behind a fiancée, Bridget Pierce, and two young children, Emily, now 7, and Aidan, now 5.

Under policies provided by Phoenix of Tennessee, Pierce received $200,000 in life insurance, but was denied worker’s compensation because an autopsy showed Guilford had recently smoked marijuana. Lawyers advised Pierce not to sue because of the drugs.

In her house on the outskirts of Murfreesboro, Tenn., Pierce keeps a framed picture of Guilford posing atop a cell tower. He’s smiling, his fists pumping in the air. After years of moving furniture and delivering pizza, he had loved his $10-an-hour climbing job, she said.

Still, Pierce cannot escape the sense that Guilford had been a disposable part to the companies that rely on men like him to go up cell towers.

“It’s like he didn’t exist,” she said. “They just pass the ball off to the next person. Everybody in this process should be held accountable.”

* * *

Until the 1990s, most tower work involved radio and television towers, which can be more than 1,000 feet high. Some phone companies employed staff climbers to work on microwave towers used for long-distance calling.

With the proliferation of cell phones, the pace and volume of tower work spiked.

Carriers blanketed the country with cell sites to extend service to the most remote areas. There are now more than 280,000 sites nationwide, up from 5,000 in 1990. Many advances in service require switching out antennas and doing other upgrades.

The surge of cell work forever altered tower climbing, an obscure field of no more than 10,000 workers. It attracted newcomers, including outfits known within the business as “two guys and a rope.” It also exacerbated the industry’s transient, high-flying culture.

Climbers live out of motel rooms, installing antennas in Oklahoma one day, building a tower in Tennessee the next. The work attracts risk-takers and rebels. Of the 33 tower fatalities for which autopsy records were available, 10 showed climbers had drugs or alcohol in their systems.

“It’s the wild, wild west of the technology industry,” said Victor Guerrero, a construction project manager and former climber. “You’ve got to have a problem to hang 150 feet in the air on an 8-inch strap. You’ve got to be insane.”

Since 2003, an analysis of OSHA records show, tower climbing has had a death rate roughly 10 times that of construction. In 2008, the agency’s top administrator, Edwin Foulke, called tower climbing “the most dangerous job in America” at an industry conference.

“That’s an alarming incidence of fatalities,” said John Henshaw, who preceded Foulke as OSHA’s administrator from 2001 to 2004. “It shouldn’t be tolerated.”

The same handful of factors crop up again and again in agency investigations of worker deaths, our reporting found. In two dozen cases, for example, inspectors found that workers on sites where fatalities occurred had received inadequate training, records show.

Climbers typically earn $10 or $11 an hour, yet some subcontracting companies demand they pay for their own safety gear, deducting money from their paychecks.

Faulty or misused equipment was identified in almost one-third of the tower-related deaths since 2003, OSHA records show. In April 2008, after 46-year-old William Bernard died in a 75-foot fall, an inspector found that his safety harness, rusty with wear, had a defective hook.

Carriers sometimes power down cell sites when climbers are on them, so subcontractors often work overnight, when fewer customers will notice disruptions. Jeremy Combs, 33, fell to his death just before midnight in September 2008, on a job where the crew wore headlamps and raced to meet an accelerated timetable, OSHA inspectors found.

Time pressure often leads tower hands to use a technique called free-climbing, in which workers don’t connect their safety harnesses to the tower. This allows them to move up, down and around more quickly, but leaves them without fall protection. In more than half of the tower fatalities we examined, workers were free-climbing, even though government safety regulations strictly prohibit it.

Wally Reardon, a veteran climber who quit in 2002, takes photos and video whenever he spots workers free-climbing to raise awareness about the practice. It often occurs within clear view of on-site supervisors and has their tacit approval, he said.

“Even the safest people I’ve worked with in the industry eventually will cave to it,” he said of the pressure to use such shortcuts.

After 32-year-old William Knorr died in a 2004 fall, OSHA found that his supervisors had “completely disregarded” safety regulations to save “Time, Work, Money,” an investigation report said. “Was there a motive? Faster and easier.”

No one knows better than Ray Hull how time pressure can lead to injuries.

In November 2003, Hull, then 35, was hired by a subcontractor to help build a 350-foot cell tower for Nextel in a cornfield near Fremont, Neb. The job needed to be done by midnight on Thanksgiving, just seven days away.

The project ran into a series of problems. The crane operator, deciding it was too windy to work, took his crane and left. Hull found replacement equipment, but it was in Texas, more than 15 hours away. Setting out to retrieve it, Hull and another tower hand, Frankie Ketchens, drove nonstop, taking turns behind the wheel.

When they arrived back at the site two days later, there was a Nextel truck near the tower’s base. Hull assumed the carrier wanted to make sure the job was on time. He was mistaken 2013 the driver was just a technician 2013 but instead of returning to their motel to sleep, Hull and Ketchens immediately went to work.

When Hull had climbed 240 feet to add a section to the tower, Ketchens pulled the wrong lever on equipment hoisting a huge piece of steel. The equipment broke away from the tower and fell to the ground 2013 with Hull attached. His safety harness broke his fall momentarily, then snapped.

Hull has no memory of falling or hitting the ground. When he came to, he saw Ketchens above him. “I said, 2018Frankie, I can’t live through this 2026 You need to tell my family I love them,” Hull recalled.

According to court records, Hull suffered massive internal injuries. He sued three companies involved with the project, and received a settlement from the subcontractor that hired his firm.

His case against Nextel was dismissed, however. In court documents, the carrier argued that its final project deadline was actually a month later and hadn’t compelled the climbers to take undue risks.

The carrier also said it wasn’t responsible for Hull, who, as a subcontractor, was “three entities removed from any relationship with a NEXTEL entity.” (Nextel merged with Sprint in 2005. Sprint declined to comment on the case.)

Hull’s injuries left him unable to climb towers. He started climbing at 14, following his father and grandfather into the business. Nearly nine years after the accident, he still misses it horribly. “There’s probably not a human being alive that loved their job as much as I did,” he said. “Everything that I could do was taken from me.”

Watching an OSHA video of the accident scene for the first time late last year, his eyes welled with tears.

“It was a bad day. Or a good day depending on which way you look at it,’ he said. “I walked away from it.”

* * *

Cell carriers give several reasons for why they outsource tower work: Building and maintaining towers, though crucial to cell service, isn’t part of their core business. Contractors have greater expertise with construction. It’s more economical to hire workers where and when needed, given the up-and-down volume of work.

“It makes good business sense for them to contract it out,” Watts said.

But handling tower work this way also insulates companies atop the contracting chain from legal and regulatory consequences when there are accidents, industry insiders say.

OSHA has the authority to cite carriers if it can prove they had direct control over work or knew of safety violations. Yet, even though some carriers set prices and timetables for tower jobs 2013 and many of their technical specifications, down to how to color code coaxial cables 2013 their supervisors typically stay off-site and do not manage jobs directly.

The oversight system provides an incentive for them not to know too much about what’s happening on work sites, labor experts say.

“Information that there are unsafe practices makes you responsible for fixing those practices,” said Thomas Kochan, a professor of management at MIT.

AT&T contracts spell out precisely what level of responsibility it wishes to have over each aspect of tower projects. In a table called the Division of Responsibilities Matrix, the carrier lists more than 100 tasks and, for each one, indicates if AT&T wants responsibility for it, to be consulted on it, or to be informed about it.

In three-year contracts issued in 2008 that were examined by ProPublica and PBS “Frontline,” the matrices were blank for safety-related items, such as ensuring that OSHA standards were met. Contractors told us they understood this to mean the carrier wanted no involvement with them at all. AT&T declined to answer questions about the matrix.

In addition to outsourcing tower work, some cell phone companies funnel jobs through middlemen known as turf vendors. AT&T does this on almost all tower jobs; in 2010, Sprint moved toward a similar system.

Turf vendors 2013 typically large construction management firms such as General Dynamics, Bechtel and Nsoro 2013 oversee batches of tower projects, subcontracting out the climbing work to smaller companies.

Ed Reynolds, AT&T’s president of network services until 2007, said middlemen lessened the administrative burden on carriers, giving them one big contractor to deal with instead of dozens of little ones.

“You got one throat to choke,” he said.

But subcontractors often contract out jobs to other subcontractors. As jobs are passed down from one company to the next, there’s less ability to control who’s actually doing the work, said Mark Hein, who has worked for several turf vendors as a construction manager.

When he was sent to check on cell sites last year, Hein discovered many subcontractors that hadn’t been approved by the turf vendor.

“I’d show up on site and expect to find Company A and instead find Company Z,” he said.

Many of the crews he came across weren’t taking the most rudimentary safety precautions.

“They didn’t have their hardhats, they didn’t have safety glasses, they didn’t have safety gear,” he said. Many of the climbers lacked training certificates.

Hein did not have time to visit every site he was assigned to supervise 2013 there were just too many, he said, a common lament among other construction managers for turf vendors.

Turf vendors also take a cut of what carriers pay for tower work 2013 sometimes 40 percent or more 2013 so subcontractors say they make less on these jobs.

In AT&T contracts examined by ProPublica and PBS “Frontline,” the carrier requires turf vendors to reduce their prices 5 percent each year over the three-year term of the contract. These reductions are typically passed through to subcontractors, industry insiders said.

“Guess who takes the hit? The next level [down],” said a construction manager for a turf vendor. “I’m not going to reduce the amount of money I take.”

Chris Deckrow, who owns a small climbing company in Michigan, showed ProPublica and PBS “Frontline” the price sheet for AT&T jobs. For the task of installing a remote radio head, the price sheet said, the carrier would pay the turf vendor $187 and the turf vendor would pay the subcontractor $93.

Deckrow said his company 2013 which often works as a subcontractor of a subcontractor 2013 has been paid as little as $40 for installing remote radio heads. Overall, he said, he makes less than half the money working for a turf vendor that he would make working directly for a carrier.

Hein said the difference in pay dictates which companies take jobs involving turf vendors.

“Rather than paying this amount to this guy, who’s really qualified and 2026 has a great reputation, they hire this person over here because he’s available right now and he’ll do it for what we want him to do it for,” he said.

Verizon, which hires subcontractors directly, tends to work with the same select group of climbing companies over and over, paying them more, subcontractors say. David Coleman, an industry analyst at RBC Capital Markets, described becoming a Verizon subcontractor as the “golden ticket.”

Several subcontractors complained that they had to cut corners to turn a profit on turfing jobs, using three-man crews instead of four, putting in 18-hour days, hiring less experienced men and working through inclement weather.

Reynolds, who now works as an industry consultant, dismissed such gripes. “There’s enough subcontractors out there willing to work,” he said. Those that don’t like the prices, he said, will “do something else.”

Buckling on a harness before mounting a 300-foot tower last March to check out a broken light, Deckrow described how tight margins erode safety.

He said he’s struggled to pay insurance premiums, cut back on training programs and delayed buying new safety gear for his men.

“This is stuff they have to wear every day in order to live through the day,” he said. “We would love to replace it every year, every two years 2026 It’s not in the budget.”

Deckrow said earlier this month that he had decided to close his company rather than making further cuts.

“I want to be able to not worry about my guys not coming home,” he said. Throughout the industry, companies are choosing between safety and staying in business, he added. “If we’re not properly maintained or trained, then people will die. It’s only a matter of time.”

* * *

The worst years for cell site fatalities in the last decade were 2006 and 2008.

There is no way to correlate these figures with workloads or to compare one carrier’s tower work to another’s because such information is proprietary. As of mid-2011, the four major carriers had varying numbers of cell sites: Verizon had 44,250, T-Mobile had 50,143, AT&T had 56,070 and Sprint had 67,500, according to data from US Wireless 411, a report by UBS.

Most inside the industry agree, however, that AT&T faced unique challenges and pressure to build out its network.

After Cingular merged with AT&T in 2004, the combined company (which later took the AT&T name) had to join its network systems, adjusting virtually every single cell site. Reynolds compared it to replacing the engines of a 747 in mid-flight.

In 2006, when the bulk of this work was done, 10 climbers died on cell site projects, including four on jobs for AT&T within two months.

William “Bubba” Cotton, 43, was the first, crushed to death on March 10 when a rope snapped, dropping a 50-pound antenna on him. According to OSHA documents and court records, the accident occurred as two crews – one aloft and one on the ground – rushed to complete work on a tower in Talladega, Ala., before an upcoming NASCAR race. AT&T would not extend the deadline for the job despite a request from a crew leader, two workers testified in sworn depositions. (The company declined to comment on the case.)

The pressure ratcheted up again when AT&T became the exclusive carrier for the iPhone.

After the phone debuted in summer 2007, triggering a tsunami of data usage, customers began complaining about dropped calls and spotty service. According to a report in Wired, AT&T went to Apple, asking for help in limiting traffic to buy time for tower upgrades. Instead, Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs explored switching to Verizon, the report said.

To prepare for the iPhone 3G’s introduction in summer 2008, AT&T poured billions of dollars into wireless capital expenditures. The push meant work on an unprecedented scale for tower climbers.

“It was nuts,” said Dan MacRae, a project manager who has worked on cell site projects for several turf vendors. “We were working in the field for 40 hours straight. They had crews in rain, sleet, snow.”

The building boom was accompanied by a string of accidents.

After two climbers died on AT&T jobs within a five-day period in April 2008, the carrier sent a letter to turf vendors calling for a construction stand down to discuss safety procedures and hold half-day courses to retrain workers.

But Guilford died just three and a half weeks after the work stoppage. Two more climbers died on AT&T jobs within the next four months.

AT&T would not answer questions about the stand down. In its statement, the carrier said that fatalities have decreased in the years since the stand down, aided by a safety initiative by OSHA and the tower industry.

Craig Lekutis 2013 the founder of WirelessEstimator.com, a trade publication for the tower climbing industry 2013 said the stand down turned out to be “more lip service” and not a long-term commitment.

Lekutis has tracked tower fatalities since 2004 and memorializes each lost climber on his website.

“Sadly, the major players know it’s happening and know that they are contributors to it,” he said, “but they don’t do anything.”

* * *

Tower-climbing fatalities have dropped considerably since the end of 2008.

Nine climbers died on cell site projects between 2009 and 2011, less than half as many as in the three previous years. There has been only one fatality on an AT&T job since 2009. Ethan “Little Britches” Hutchinson, 18, died in May 2010 after falling from a tower in Arkansas when his safety gear malfunctioned.

Some in the industry point to improved safety practices to explain the smaller death toll. Others say the recession cut into the volume of tower work and that, after finishing 3G upgrades, much of what carriers needed could be done on the ground.

With the next big push 2013 building out 4G LTE networks 2013 just getting underway in major markets, some veteran climbers worry that the fatality numbers will rise again.

“If not this year, another bad year is going to come,” said Reardon, the tower industry veteran. “It’s all about trying to do things faster and cheaper.”

The subcontracting system remains much as it was during the worst years, climbers say.

There are also many young men like Jay Guilford, with few prospects and no experience, willing to climb towers if it means a steady paycheck.

Years later, the horror of Guilford’s death remains fresh to Pierce, who was engaged to him at the time. She remembers receiving the phone call from his father as she arrived home from shopping for an upcoming trip to Disney World.

“I freaked out and screamed and just screamed and screamed,” she said.

Yet, about a year and a half later, when her current boyfriend was out of work, Pierce approached Phoenix of Tennessee to ask if he could apply to be a tower climber.

In retrospect, she regretted doing so, she said, but it was the only company she knew that had work. Ultimately, he found a job at Jack in the Box.

Guilford’s stepbrother, Anthony Acker, also sometimes works as a tower climber. The family tried to talk him out of returning to it about a year ago.

“He said, Don’t worry about me, old man, I’m being careful,” said Gary Hart, Acker’s father and Guilford’s stepfather. “I just hope it all works out for him because I don’t want to go through all this again.”

Read more: http://www.propublica.org/article/cell-tower-fatalities/single#ixzz1x8zW7gdc

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It took 66 antennas divided into 11 groups to ensure Celtics and Bruins fans could get LTE coverage inside the arena

The carrier hosted a handful of media representatives and AT&T executives on Monday for a tour of the system.

The DAS improves mobile network coverage throughout the 700,000-square-foot TD Garden thanks to 66 strategically placed antennas that form 11 separate “zones.” These zones help AT&T evenly distribute its cellular signal, which is piped into the arena via fiber optic cables and then beamed to the individual antennas from the data-center-like DAS on the tenth floor of the TD Garden. (Check out the video below for a look at DAS at TD Garden.)
AT&T’s New LTE-Capable DAS at Boston’s TD Garden

“At AT&T, we’re huge sports fans in Boston,” Steve Krom, VP and general manager, AT&T New England, told reporters. “We’re excited that our customers [at TD Garden] are going to be able to make calls, send text messages, surf the Web and even post a picture to their favorite social media websites, and they’ll be able to do that on both of AT&T’s 4G networks.”

Krom said the carrier has been working on the DAS at TD Garden for almost three years. TD Garden’s total capacity is just under 20,000, and AT&T says the new DAS should help provide significantly faster data (EDGE, HSPA+ and LTE) transfers and improve voice and text reliability for a full house of Celtics or Bruins fans.

“We’re working to enhance the building,” said Amy Latimer, SVP of sales and marketing, TD Garden. “We’re almost 17 years old this year, and as you can imagine cell phone coverage and the demand from our clients, and even internally, has increased. There have been times in the past when we haven’t been able to connect with people. We want customers coming in here to not only experience great events and great sporting events, but also be able to share with their friends and families.”

Krom wouldn’t talk specifics when it comes to cost, but AT&T says it spent more than US$475 million in Massachusetts on both its wired and wireless networks between 2009 and 2011. AT&T also says it made nearly 745 wireless-network upgrades in the greater Boston area in 2011, including the addition of seven new cell sites and/or towers.

The TD Garden is not the only Boston sports venue that’s home to an AT&T DAS; both Fenway Park, home of the Red Sox, and Gillette Stadium, home field of the New England Patriots, also have AT&T DAS centers.

However, the TD Garden system is unique because it’s completely indoors, and the facility, which is composed of many thick concert walls, presents a number of unique wireless challenges, according to Krom.

To view the original article, visit: http://www.itworldcanada.com/news/how-cell-coverage-was-boosted-at-bostons-td-garden/145469#ixzz1vv4L33dA
or visit http://www.itworldcanada.com for more Canadian IT News

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A ruling that confirms Wind Mobile’s compliance with Canadian ownership rules clears the way for the company to focus on growth, but is not expected to trigger a rush of buyouts or foreign investment in the wireless industry.

On Thursday the Supreme Court denied rival Public Mobile leave to appeal a Federal Court of Appeal decision that had upheld Globalive Wireless Management Corp.’s right to offer a national cellular service under the Wind brand.

The court, which did not release reasons for the decision, denied a complaint by Public Mobile that alleged Wind violated rules governing foreign ownership of telecom service companies because it is effectively foreign owned.

The SCC ruling is largely moot, however, given the Conservative government’s move in March to ease foreign investment limits on small telecom firms to foster competition and consumer choice in the cellphone service sector.

And while the SCC decision clears the way for firms to prepare for a federal auction of wireless spectrum expected early next year, Bob Boron, Public Mobile’s general counsel, said “we may not see the floodgates opening.”

He said the limits on foreign investments that remain and the chance that the more established wireless providers will grab most of the new spectrum may continue to discourage new investment.

Boron said some consolidation remains possible in the industry, which could occur before the spectrum auction, but said it would likely happen among the newer entrants.

Still, he said opening Canada’s wireless market and the settlement of the Wind Mobile legal issues create a level playing field for the upstart competitors.

“Although it is unfortunate that the SCC has chosen not to resolve the confusion over cabinet’s authority in varying the decisions of administrative bodies, Public Mobile has been successful on the issue that really matters,” he said.

“The core issue in this case has always been the uneven playing field created by the cabinet’s Globalive decision — a decision which gave special treatment to a single foreign investor.”

Anthony Lacavera, Wind’s chief executive, welcomed the Supreme Court’s decision. “We are interested in fighting in the marketplace, not in fighting in courtrooms.

“I feel really good now about approaching our investors and new potential investors that can back us now with confidence that all of our regulatory and legal issues are fully and finally behind us.”

In a report this month, Moody’s Investors Service said the new wireless players created after the auction of spectrum in 2008 continue to struggle to grab market share from the three major providers, Bell, Rogers and Telus, which it said account for more than 90 per cent of the market.

Bill Wolfe, a wireless industry analyst for the ratings agency, said the three upstarts have been constrained by a lack of capital and could eventually be acquired by a company such as Shaw Communications Inc., Quebecor Inc., Bragg Communications Inc., or regional telecom companies SaskTel or Manitoba Telecom Services.

He called it unlikely new wireless companies would merge because the move would not add wireless infrastructure or increase their access to capital.

Wolfe also downplayed the likelihood of Rogers, Bell or Telus buying one of the new entrants, saying such a development would run counter to Ottawa’s aim of promoting competition to benefit consumers.

He said consolidation likely won’t begin until after August 2013 when major wireless carriers will be allowed to buy smaller rivals under government rules.

UBS analyst Phillip Huang in a note to investors said changes to foreign ownership limits that allow more offshore investment buy the newer entrants time, arguing the consolidation in the cellphone industry is “not necessarily imminent.”

Article written by Alastair Sharp.

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“I don’t blame them for having concern,” says Janine Brooker.

But base your concern on the facts, she adds.

The Lower Mainland is covered with cellphone towers, including residential areas.

“If you’re really concerned about your safety, throw away your computer, your cellphone, your microwave,” she said.

“If you don’t want to be near a cellphone tower, don’t go into Maple Ridge. I would strongly suggest that you move away if you’re that concerned.”

Nearby residents in the Whonnock Against Cellphone Tower group, based in the 276th Street area ,are worried about dropping real estate values near cell towers, health risks and possible environmental damage from a tower built next to a stream.

They’ve circulated a petition, collecting 100 names opposing the project, and spoke to Maple Ridge council on Monday.

Brooker, though, counters by noting that her realtor says there’s a minimal effect on home prices, while good cellphone reception could be an asset, and if you’re lucky enough to own the land on which a cell tower is created, your property could be particularly prized.

Brooker, a business agent with the Hospital Employees Union, said she wasn’t interested when Telus first approached and asked to lease a piece of her land for the tower.

“I walked away from them many times because I wasn’t satisfied with what they were offering. I told them many times to go away, but they kept coming after me.”

Alcatel-Lucent is constructing the tower for Telus.

She then hired a consultant, Antenna Management Corp., to help her with the negotiations.

Eventually she hammered out an agreement that offers better money, more information and a safety inspection after the first month of operation to ensure the tower is meeting Industry Canada safety standards.

It’s part of her retirement plan, she adds, noting she has two children living on the property, while grand kids also visit.

Brooker added that her consultant will get information on cell towers, which will be passed on to concerned residents, though she doesn’t want to attend the meetings.

Antenna Management Corp. president Roy Bennett said, generally, communications companies present homeowners with a template agreement, on which he tries to improve to the benefit of the homeowner.

The average annual lease for cell towers ranges between $1,000 and $3,000 a year for each antenna that’s attached to the tower. Ideally, the homeowner will be able to have control of any future antennas that go on to the tower and, thus, get the lease money. But often cellphone companies want to control that.

Sometimes, depending on a tower location, property owners can earn up to $75,000 a year.

Bennett wouldn’t say how much Brooker is getting.

“She has a fair rate.”

Bennett said Vancouver now has more than 500 cellphone towers. Previously, they were located in non-residential areas, but now consumer demand is forcing those towers into residential areas.

An iPod now uses 1,300 times more band with than a voice-only cellphone, he pointed out. Concerns about health effects are diminishing. It’s similar to when television came in – people were worried about X-rays from the tube.

He added that more radio frequency waves are given off from fluorescent lights than cellphone towers.

Heather McNeill of Whonnock ACT told council that a World Health Organization study points to high radio frequency waves as possibly carcinogenic. She pointed out that while towers are supposed to meet Industry Canada’s Safety Code 6, that’s currently under review.

She told council that the petition asked that cellphone towers not be located in residential areas or near schools and said that a study done in Colwood, near Victoria, showed that property values near cell towers dropped seven per cent.

The group also wants Maple Ridge to create a policy on cellphone tower placement and not to endorse Alcatel’s proposal.

However, according to the American Cancer Society, there’s “little evidence” to support that cell towers are a health risk.

MP Randy Kamp told council that it should develop a policy on cellphone towers rather than use the default policy of Industry Canada, which requires notification of all residents living within a radius that’s three times the height of the tower, as well as newspaper advertising.

Cell towers are under federal jurisdiction and municipalities cannot decide their locations.

However, a staff report says there’s “some flexibility” in siting the towers and that applicants have to consult with Maple Ridge. That consultation is still ongoing.

If the district had its own policy, the issue would be clearer for residents, Kamp added.

But Coun. Judy Dueck said that could be creating a false sense of hope when the district has no say in whether a cell tower is built within its borders.

However, the district could express where it would like towers to go and the proponent could consider that, Kamp said.

While the tower wouldn’t have to meet local bylaws, it would have to comply with the Fisheries Act or the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.

The district then can say whether it concurs with the project or not.

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