Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Cell phone dead zones

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 06 Jan 2003 12:25:52 -0500

Cell phone dead zones

Customers tired of airwave problems are posting locations where service is problematic on
the Net

By Kathryn Balint
STAFF WRITER

January 6, 2003

"Hello. Can you hear me?"

So begins a call from Bill Pollett on his cell phone.

This time, at least, the call went through.

In October, Pollett switched cell-phone companies because he encountered too many "dead
zones."

He's trying to get out of his contract with his current provider because of – what else? –
dead zones, one of which is at his home in Alpine.

Question is, will his next cell-phone provider be any better?

All of the nation's wireless carriers – and their 137 million customers – seem to suffer
from dead zones where calls cut out or don't get through.

In a Consumer Reports survey of 22,000 cell phone users that appears in the magazine's
February issue, 10 percent said they couldn't get service, 14 percent said they
experienced dropped calls and 11 percent said their calls were marred by static or other
interference.

Dead airwaves are such a problem that consumer advocates want wireless carriers to
pinpoint where their service works and where it doesn't.

Carriers are balking. So frustrated cell-phone customers are making their own lists of
dead zones and posting them on the Web.

Among the sites: DeadCellZones.com (http://www.deadcellzones.com) and The Dead Zone
(http://www.ucan.org/cellphonedeadzones), run by the San Diego-based Utility Consumers'
Action Network.

DeadCellZones.com, which covers 43 cities, lists 194 problem areas for six wireless
carriers in San Diego County.

UCAN's site focuses just on San Diego County, listing 1,483 dead zones for those six
carriers.

Michael Shames, UCAN's executive director, said the nonprofit organization started the Web
site this past summer so prospective customers could research the holes in cell-phone
coverage before signing any long-term contracts.

"The tales of dead zones approached urban legend," he said. "Everybody had their own
story, and they all bordered on horror stories."

Shames and other consumer advocates say wireless carriers dupe prospective customers by
failing to disclose the dead zones.

The coverage maps that carriers do provide show wide regions where their services
supposedly work. In fine print, customers are warned that coverage isn't guaranteed in
those areas.

"A true coverage map would look like a piece of Swiss cheese," said Carl Hilliard, a
retired law school professor who heads the nonprofit Wireless Consumers Alliance, based in
Del Mar.

He contends that cell-phone companies are well aware of where dead zones exist. Yet they
refuse to share that data publicly because, Hilliard believes, "they don't want consumers
to see how bad they are."

Earlier this year, UCAN, the Wireless Consumers Alliance and others asked the California
Public Utilities Commission to require that cell-phone companies disclose their dead
zones. And last month, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., called upon the Federal
Communications Commission to do the same thing.

Attempts to require cell-phone carriers to publish maps of their dead zones have met
fierce opposition from the industry.

The cell-phone industry says it would be impossible to produce up-to-date maps since
network problems are constantly changing.

"The map would vary hour to hour," said John Mendez, spokesman for AT&T Wireless. "It
would not be practical."

Mendez compares a cell-phone signal to the beam of a flashlight in a darkened room.
Furniture, or even architectural features, can block the light from reaching the other
side of the room.

The same sort of thing can happen with a cell-phone signal. Rain, buildings, mountains,
even radio frequencies from electronic devices can interfere with the signal, resulting in
dropped calls, busy signals or no service at all.

Towers resisted

But the biggest culprit for America's cell-phone woes is demand.

Cellular antennas that are responsible for transmitting the calls can handle only a finite
number of them. The more users in an area, the more likely the cellular network will be
overloaded.

"It's not like I'm on a mountain slope in Carlsbad," said Brian Whalen, who can't get his
cell phone to work at his home in Mira Mesa.

The solution? Add more antennas.

Cell-phone companies say that's not easy because neighbors, planning groups and
municipalities resist their plans to build more towers.

For instance, AT&T Wireless' attempt to place a tower in Rancho Peñasquitos, to improve
cellular service for motorists on Interstate 15, ended up in court. AT&T lost.

And, in response to complaints from residents, the county of San Diego is considering
stricter regulations on where cell phone towers may be built in unincorporated areas.

Public resistance to the towers isn't the entire issue, though.

Hilliard of the Wireless Consumers Alliance said part of the problem is that carriers
won't install a new tower unless they can make a sufficient return on the investment.
Until then, customers must put up with busy signals, dropped calls and dead air time
caused by an overloaded network.

Jeff Cohn, who created DeadCellZones.com, complains that cell-phone companies put too much
emphasis on developing new moneymaking features, such as video or wireless Web access.

"They're rolling out new products that consumers don't want or desire or need, and yet
they can't fix the basic service," said Cohn, of Manhattan Beach.

Capital improvements

Cell-phone companies have taken some steps to improve service.

Like its "Can you hear me now?" television ad, Verizon Wireless says it really does send
employees out on the streets to test the quality of calls.

The industry spent $19 billion in capital improvements from June 2001 to June 2002. And in
the last four years, the number of cellular antennas in the United States has doubled to
131,350.

Carriers also have been shifting to new digital technology, which can squeeze three times
the number of calls into the same amount of airwaves.

Even so, the dead zones seem to proliferate. They're a maddening inconvenience for most
cell-phone users.

For others, dead zones can be disastrous. Consider the horror story of Marcia Spielholz.

She was driving through the west side of Los Angeles when two men tried to carjack her
BMW. She sped off, trying to dial 911 on her cell phone as they pursued her.

Little did she know, she was in a dead zone. The carjackers forced her vehicle off the
road and shot her in the face.

Nearly two dozen surgeries and eight years later, Spielholz's experience underscores the
need to either fill in the gaps in cell-phone coverage or at least tell customers where
those gaps are.

"It's a big liability," Cohn said.

Kathryn Balint: (619) 293-2848; [email-masked]

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/mon/business/news_mz1b6cellpho.html

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From: "Todd Ellis" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Jan 2003 12:30:32 -0500

The site listed doesn't have any mention of Raleigh, NC, Richmond, VA, or
Columbia, SC - three state capitols and major cities. I guess we don't have
any dead spots (aside from most of my skull where hair no longer grows).

Todd Ellis
  -----Original Message-----
  From: Marcel [mailto:[email-masked]]
  Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 12:26 PM
  To: [email-masked]
  Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Cell phone dead zones

  Cell phone dead zones

  Customers tired of airwave problems are posting locations where service is
problematic on
  the Net