Incentive Auction Transition No Problem, T-Mobile, Tower Climbing Companies Tell FCC
The FCC’s 39-month timetable for the post-TV incentive auction transition is time enough, said Grundy Integration, RIO Steel & Tower and T-Mobile in a meeting at the FCC. The company representatives met with Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake, Gary Epstein,…
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chairman of the Incentive Auction Task Force, and other FCC officials, said a filing in docket 14-252. “Representatives from the tower-climbing companies estimated that the average antenna installation project takes two to four weeks, though they emphasized that there is no typical installation,” the filing said. “A low-elevation, side-mounted, high-frequency antenna installation could be done in as few as five days. An extremely complex, high-elevation, top-mounted, low-frequency antenna installation could take six weeks or more, though the tower climbing experts characterized an installation of this complexity and length as "an outlier.” Both tower companies have the personnel to help complete the transition, they said. Equipment isn't an issue, they said. “RIO operates its own full turnkey tower fabrication facility,” the filing said. “This facility produces pole derricks called gin poles; complete tower structures, such as guyed towers up to 1,500 feet and self-support towers up to 450 feet; and the components necessary for tower modifications and strengthening. RIO can fabricate a gin pole in as little as two weeks once it has the design specifications.” T-Mobile, expected to be a major player in the 600 MHz auction, has said repeatedly that broadcasters should be able to complete the repacking within the 39 months mandated by the FCC and within the $1.75 billion budget established by Congress (see 1602180063). “Until we know how many stations will need to move and to what channels, it remains an exercise in futility to argue that the FCC set precisely the right deadline and that there should be no safety valve whatsoever for stations unable to transition in time,” an NAB spokesman said in response to T-Mobile.