NEW YORK-When it comes to siting wireless communications towers, passing “Go” means collecting a lot more than $200.
Tower placement ease got a boost from Section 704 of the new federal telecommunications law which, “sets explicit national (tower) siting standards resulting from a negotiated rulemaking process,” said Sheldon Moss, manager of the Site Owners and Managers Association. SOMA is part of the Personal Communications Industry Association of Alexandria, Va. Section 704, which PCIA and other industry groups lobbied for, was included over the objections of organizations representing local governments, among them the National League of Cities and the National Association of Counties, Moss said.
The ability to appeal tower siting denials to federal courts, a provision that also is part of Section 704, is an additional bargaining chip in dealing with reluctant local governments. But delays in installing systems caused by lengthy appeals cost time, which equals money.
Therefore, passing muster with the 30,000 or so local government agencies who have original jurisdiction is critical. As an increasing number of wireless players enter the arena, making peace at the local level becomes more important than ever. Herewith, then, are some suggestions from the trenches to improve approval chances.
Toby Laughlin, a residential real estate developer, owns 110 acres on the border between the New Jersey townships of Princeton and Hopewell, an area where houses cost up to $1 million. Next door, on land belonging to an out-of-state owner, Bell Atlantic Corp. and Comcast Corp. leased space on a 100-foot tower that once was used by a trucking company. The site had been grandfathered as-is into the revised zoning code as a pre-existing non-conforming use.
When Bell Atlantic and Comcast applied to the Hopewell Township Zoning Board of Adjustment to expand the number of antennas on the tower, “we fought their application tooth and nail,” Laughlin said.
Subsequently, however, Laughlin Real Estate, of which Laughlin is president, decided to switch rather than fight. It negotiated to buy Bell Atlantic’s and Comcast’s rights to use the tower and also bought the parcel of hilltop land on which the tower sits.
That was the easy part. Next step was an application, recently approved, to the Hopewell zoning board for a 170-foot guide tower. Tenants on the tower site will include Bell Atlantic, Comcast, another cellular carrier, plus paging and personal communications services providers.
“Towns are scared that once they approve one tower application, they will have opened a Pandora’s box,” Laughlin said. “We were able to sell it to them as a proposal that will cover the future needs for other wireless carriers.”
That decision is indicative of a new trend in tower siting, according to Warren Stillwell, an Atlantic City, N.J., attorney who represented Laughlin Real Estate before the Hopewell Township board. The application, he said, was his 150th, of which two have been rejected.
“There is absolutely no doubt that good land use decisions are evolving toward a philosophy of shared use,” Stillwell said. “It used to be that a town would permit one company and no others, on a single tower.”
Opposition toward “co-location,” the industry term for shared use, also has come from the carriers themselves, said Kenneth Foster, an associate professor of bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Foster conducts research into the effects of electromagnetic frequencies-of which radio waves are one kind-on human cells. He serves as a consultant to the wireless industry, testifying at local board meetings about the scientific findings. He testified on behalf of Laughlin Real Estate.
“A lot of (wireless) companies go around wanting to put up a tower every time they need a base station because company A doesn’t want to operate a cell site on company B’s tower for a variety of reasons, including liability and competition,” Foster said.
While many people like to complain about the heavy hand of the federal government, the new federal telecom bill seems likely to have two unusual but welcome outcomes, according to Moss. By weakening the hand of local governments with respect to denying tower sites, the law also will strengthen their already emerging resolve to maximize their zoning and planning jurisdiction by requiring co-location as a condition of tower site approval. Co-location requirements handed down from a government could provide an out for wireless carriers otherwise reluctant to share tower sites with competitors.
Sophisticated cluster zoning of similar land uses will help diffuse residents’ objections to towers on the basis of undesirable appearance, said Foster of the University of Pennsylvania. “Health issues often become a surrogate for aesthetics in the minds of the public,” he said.
For David Brotzman, administrator of the national Association of Tower Erectors, Watertown, S.D., “Objections about cosmetics represent the majority of complaints.” Consequently, tower erectors have gotten quite creative in designing fully functional structures that blend into their surroundings, he said.
One of the newest developments in camouflage is the installation of “sectored antenna arrays” right down the middle of electric power line transmission towers. “These reduce zoning problems tremendously because they represent changes to pre-existing uses; plus, you can secure a number of sites at the same time and reduce costs,” Brotzman said. “The only drawback is you’re limited in height.”
Another advance on the engineering front is the development of techniques to boost the transmission capabilities of individual antennas, thereby reducing the need for so many, said Tim Ayers, vice president of communications for the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association.
Government property-local, state or federal-should be given primary consideration in siting selection by wireless carriers, said attorney Stillwell. Site rental, especially where emergency services communications already are clustered, can save carriers money. And it offers a revenue source for governments, which may therefore be more receptive to applications.
The drawback to this approach is that revenue-strapped local governments may try to steer wireless carriers to their sites, even if another location is superior from a transmission standpoint, Moss said.
Even if the ideal location from an engineering standpoint is next to a school or across the street from an apartment building, avoid these kinds of public relations disasters in the making, Foster said.
Last but not least is the issue of presentation. “Get a lawyer who is easygoing and respectful,” Laughlin recommended.
“Companies should train their people who discuss issues with the public in how to talk to the public,” Foster said. “They should use laymen’s terms and not talk over the heads of the audience.”
He and others also recommended bringing in beneficiaries of wireless services to testify, including managers of ambulance and other emergency services.
