Comments on: Photos: Spot the cell phone tower

Carriers try all sorts of tricks to blend high-tech towers into the landscape.

[drborchers]

These are not cell towers

These are not cell phone towers. Anybody who has lived in Hawaii will recognize these towers as condos by downtown Honolulu.

[drborchers]

Condos not Towers

Right, those are condos.

looks like they got duped

The photo appears to have come from here:
http://community.webshots.com/photo/181870109/186320276VgwnVz

Don't know why this photo is labeled "cell phone tower", as the only tower is obviously a building, and far too elaborate for a mere signal tower.

[LFLFM]

Erm... Built in?

I've never even been to Hawaii, but couldnt the cell phone transmiters be hidden in (or on) the tower(s)?
Just a thought...

OR, if you notice on the bottom, the picture comes from a webshots catalog, there may be an index confusion, so its not the correct picture.
Just another thought...

=D

[c094728]

cell phone towers is their name

It's called cell phone towers because they kind of look like a handheld cellphone.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/181870109/1863
20276VgwnVz

[W Grant]

The Dark Tree in Lower Left is the Tower

At least this is my guess... I have not been there and those
speaking of other items they see in the picture I am sure are
right but I don't think this picture is mislabeled or that is the
issue. If you look at the Tree that is closest to what seems like a
small utility building up front in the lower left of the picture it
looks to me like that tree is not really a tree as you can see
things in it that resemble the other pictures. Any how just my
take on it :)

[W Grant]

Correction... Referring to Picture #8

I replied to the thread from Picture 8 and after looking back it
seems that the original Post was from the other picture... Not
sure why they have this set up to have the postings follow onto
this picture 8 page...

Compare with Pic 1

Copy this pic to your computer. Enlarge it. You will see the same profile of the cell antenna in the Palm Tree in pic 1 in the tree to the lower left of center in front.

Africa got this FIRST

This IS NOT NEW. I live in South Africa and have been seeing these for what? About two to three years - America doen't allways get everything first :-))

Try more than 10 years

Having worked in one of the original Cell Phone rollout teams for Northern California 10 years ago we were doing those towers back then. Most people simply are too blind during their commute to ever notice a new fake tree erected overnight. You might be surprised to find that your local gas station or fast food joint has burried in their illuminated signs a cell phone repeater as well. And all this was out long before we started into the foray. The problem is that they are expensive to do so generally the cell phone companies prefer to not do them and put up the ugly ones instead. 10 years ago it was around $50,000 per "tree" -not sure what the going rate today would be.

Arizona has some interesting ones

Down in Tucson (Saddlebrooke) there is one shaped like a saguaro
cactus.

Most Innovative Cell Tower

The most innovative cell tower (not really stealthy) is in Ann Arbor. It is a modern design that does not attempt to hide the fact that it is a cell tower- see a picture at http://www.steelintheair.com.

Hundreds of Cell/PCS Site Photos

The photos in this story are interesting, but for those of you who are looking for very high quality photos of many, many different types of cell and PCS sites, please feel free to visit www.KramerFirm.com/cells/

We work for governments permitting cell sites, and these photos are used by governments around the country as visual examples of what can (and in some cases, should not) be done by carriers.

-Jonathan Kramer