AT&T celebrates opening of 190-foot-tall cell tower at Hoover Met Complex
AT&T and Hoover officials today celebrated the construction and beginning of operation of a new cell phone tower at the Hoover Metropolitan Complex.
The 190-foot-tall tower should greatly enhance AT&T cell service at the complex and surrounding area, including Hoover Metropolitan Stadium, the Finley Center, outdoor sports fields and tennis complex, the Hoover RV Park, splash pad, playground, nearby schools, businesses and homes, said Wayne Hutchens, president of AT&T’s operations in Alabama.
Up until about a month ago, the Hoover Met Complex and surrounding area was served by a cell tower along Interstate 459 near the Sprouts grocery store, but the volume of cellular activity in western Hoover has increased to the point that another tower was needed, AT&T officials said.
A typical cell phone tower in a suburban area covers a couple of miles, but “Birmingham terrain is pretty hilly, and that makes things challenging,” said Owen Workman, a radio access network engineer for AT&T’s Gulf States region, which includes Alabama. “We have to build more towers. The signal just can’t get over the hills and down into the valleys that well.”
The new tower at the Hoover Met Complex is on one of the highest spots around, Workman said.
Hoover Mayor Frank Brocato said having strong cell service at the Hoover Met Complex is extremely important. Sports tourism is very important to the city’s economy, and people coming to sporting events and other kinds of events at the complex need good cell service, Brocato said.
City officials knew one of the most important things they could do to improve the SEC Baseball Tournament experience for fans and teams alike was to improve the cell service in that part of town, the mayor said.
But the new tower also will benefit people nearby the complex, Brocato said. “This whole area is really the hot part of Hoover,” in regard to new homes and retail centers being built, he said.
Greg Knighton, the city’s economic developer, said strong cell service also is a critical part of economic development. Businesses looking for places to locate consider it critical to be able to communicate with their employees when they are at home or moving from place to place, Knighton said.
Hutchens said the new tower also will help deploy the new FirstNet dedicated wireless broadband network for first responders.
Hutchens thanked the city of Hoover for its partnership with AT&T, allowing the company to build its tower on city property through a lease agreement.
“These folks encourage business investment so that communities like Hoover can continue to advance,” Hutchens said.
The city of Hoover is a model for welcoming investment and removing barriers to deployment of wireless services, from large towers to small cell facilities, he said.
Towers such as this cost about $500,000 to build, but the cost can rise to about $1 million when fiber-optic lines have to be extended as well, Workman said.
AT&T has increased its cell tower construction in recent years, going from about 15 new towers in Alabama three years ago to about 50 new towers a year, Workman said. Deployment of the FirstNet network for first responders prompted a lot of that investment, Hutchens said.
From 2016 to 2018, AT&T has invested $1.4 billion to improve its products and services in Alabama, Hutchens said.
State Sen. Jabo Waggoner, whose district includes Hoover, said new towers such as this are evidence of growth.
He is chairman of a legislative committee considering statewide legislation concerning deployment of “small cell” towers. The Alabama League of Municipalities opposed a bill that came up last year, but he hopes his committee can come up with a reasonable compromise that cities can support “because that’s what economic development is all about.”