Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Hardware

Vanishing Mobile Phone Masts 204

Posted by Hemos from the locking-them-down dept.
babycakes writes "The BBC has an article about the concealment of mobile phone antennae in the UK, where the masts have been disguised as clock face hands, chimneys and so on. The company behind them, The Undetectables (flash site) aim to 'eradicate this architectural acne' - pics available."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Vanishing Mobile Phone Masts More

Vanishing Mobile Phone Masts

Comments Filter:
  • How am I supposed to know to be pissed off when I'm standing right under one and still not getting any reception?

  • Ha... (Score:3)

    by T3kno ( 51315 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:19PM (#4300319) Homepage
    We have these horribly fake looking metal palm trees all around my house. The first time you look at it you have to do a double take. They're so strange looking that the birds will fly around them. I'd rather look at the triangle antenna.

    • Re:Ha... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Wakkow ( 52585 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:24PM (#4300346) Homepage
      my thoughts exactly.. Quick search on google comes across this page [qsl.net] with *ooooh* pretty pictures [qsl.net].
    • Wouldn't it be possible to mount these antennas to real trees? This would seem more natural to me...
      • Wouldn't it be possible to mount these antennas to real trees?

        Cellular antenna and microwave dish alignment are critical. When the tree grows, you lose that.
        • I thought trees grow only on the ends - the top, in this case. If you place a sign on a tree two meters above the ground, you come back ten years later, will the sign have 'climbed'? No.

          Other reasons I can think of: The leaves getting in the way, the instability of the tree (compared to normal masts), the fact that they have to stick out of the rest. But who knows what the future [slashdot.org] will bring...
          • Ever wonder where those growth rings in the cross section of a tree trunk come from ?

            yes. If you nail a sign to the side of a tree it will rise higher. If it dosn't seam to that just because that tree is growing realy slow.

    • We have these horribly fake looking metal palm trees all around my house.

      The fake palms I've seen in the San Jose/Santa Cruz area aren't so bad. The fake pine tree I saw somewhere was butt ugly. I've known for ages that these things have been being hidden anywhere high, one example being a church getting a nice piece of change for placing one in their belltower.

      This must be a slow newsday, for an article like this to come up, though.

      Funnier was this about face: Opteron To Support Palladium [amdzone.com] Had me an anxiety attack for a moment there...

    • Ibelca is a Spanish company that also works in that same area of "hiding" antennas. Here you can see some examples of antenna trees just in case you were wondering ;)

      Ibelca [ibelca.com]

    • Re:Ha... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Alan Partridge ( 516639 )
      I agree wholeheartedly. There seems to be a huge movement to outlaw mobile 'phone masts and DTH satellite dishes in the UK, despite the fact that they're both ENORMOUSLY less visually intrusive than the telephone poles and TV aerials that they supplant. Fucking Luddites is what it is.
  • Sounds to me like these guys are just trying to make money for doing something totally useless. It almost seems like a kind of a trend right now.
    • But that hasn't stopped Microsoft from trying.
    • I do not think it is useless. It keeps the original "view" of a certain place. I live in a country that is about completely covered for cellphone usage, but I never have seen a cellphone mast...at least not like the one the pictured in the article. I don't want big ugly towers every 35km, if they can make them invisible it is worth the cost.
      Anyways, the cell-phone users are paying the extra expense anyway and I'm happy with that.
      • I don't want big ugly towers every 35km, if they can make them invisible it is worth the cost.

        Fair enough. Personally, I think that they should use something other than fake trees! Like water towers, buildings, and so on.

        Although you only have to put the towers up every 70 km if you want to cover a distance (35 km radius == 70 km diameter).

        Michael
    • Sure, it's functionally useless. Like the top of a car, a GUI, or the handle of a knife.

      Making it pretty isn't about utility. It's about ergonomics and aesthetics. I mean, there's a cell tower I drive by and it has a horrific sign by the mayor bitching and moaning about it. Hiding the cell tower makes it easier to palette and helps prevent this form of complaint.

      Reception problems, thought, are entirely another matter.

  • maybe it is just me ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Alien54 ( 180860 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:20PM (#4300327) Journal
    but I want to disquise one as an object most appropriate to express my feelings about my local, regional, and national politicians.

    There must be some appropriate gesture....

  • Phily area camouflage (Score:5, Funny)

    by Arctic Fox ( 105204 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:22PM (#4300335) Homepage Journal
    They're making them look like big ass trees. The best one is on the PA Turnpike near Willow Grove. It's in the middle of a wooded area. It looks good except, it's easily three times the size of normal trees, oh, and in the winter, it's the only one with leaves on it!!!!
  • In my town, they've put the antenna on top of the church tower... and put the cross on top op the antenna. Really, that looks horrible. I guess they've done it for the money the get from the network provider.

  • This antenna cannot be seen (Score:5, Funny)

    by Qrlx ( 258924 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:23PM (#4300344) Homepage Journal
    This antenna cannot be seen. Unfortunately, it has chosen a rather obvious piece of cover...

    BOOM!

  • Rules in the UK (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Deton8 ( 522248 )
    This sort of thing is more useful in the UK, as there are numerous historical preservation zones where you can't even have a visible satellite dish. In the middle of a town, it's much easier to get permission if the mast is invisible. That, and the local schools won't start bitching about the unreasonably high rate of student's brain tumors if the masts are invisible.
    • This issue reminds me of the people who make "cozies" for things. "Goodness! We can't have it look like what it actually is!". I think functional antennae are beautiful, whatever their form.
      On the schools issue, This [foxnews.com] should put that bit of stupidity to rest. It won't of course, because people are stupid.
      • Fox News is not a source I would trust at all. They have a history [fair.org] of distorting things [webactive.com] in favour of big business (and the Republican party). (This edition of Counterspin describes some Fox bullshit about 9 minutes into the program.)

        As much as I think it's unlikely that low power non-ionizing EM radiation is harmful, I wouldn't ask anyone to take Fox's word for it. The article provides enough information to do some digging and maybe come up with a journal article, but I wouldn't trust Fox's reporting on anything besides sports results.

      • We get fox news on satellite here in the UK and I wouldnt trust anything they said about mobile phone masts.
        I always wonder though if the people who complain about masts have mobiles themselves, or their kids they are trying to protect.
  • After all, in this post 9-11 time, who would object to a big flag flying atop a big flag pole?
  • I saw a picture of one that was a cactus in the Wall Street Journal. I am pretty sure cactii that tall do not exist

  • is it really that important? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by cdf12345 ( 412812 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:26PM (#4300364) Homepage Journal
    I mean, I never thought attennas were that much of an eyesore. While I'm all for making them smaller and whatnot, I sure as hell wouldn't make them all cute and crap if I lose performance.
    • Some people might consider preserving Historic cities a notch above your ability maintain a clear signal, while endangering the lives of those around you while you chat in your auto.
    • Instead of making them eyesores, why not make the attenas themselves sculptures? Maybe create different styles of antennas. Why do people think that technology has to be hidden like it's such a bad thing? It's like those wooden computer cabinets that are designed to hide the computer so you don't have to look at it. I would never purchase one.
      • yeah especially since I just put in the tinted windows and neon case lights!

        seriously though, I'm all for having atheticly pleasing technology, but I'm not for doing it if the type of service the tech provides is degraded
    • In this country at least (the UK) the general public are worried about radiation from these things.

      I mean people have gotten *really* upset when these things (the un-disguised ones I mean ) are put up right next to schools etc.

      I personally wouldn't buy a house near one of them but now the B*st*rds are secreting them so I buy the house and the should the disguised mast be discovered everyone's house loses value 'coz everyone else is like me & wouldn't buy a house next to a frigging phone mast!!!!!!

  • And in church steeples (Score:4, Interesting)

    by MongooseCN ( 139203 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:29PM (#4300383) Homepage
    Down in Cape Cod in Wellfleet, there is a cell phone antennae inside of a church steeple (I forget which one). The church gets paid something like 50,000-100,000$ a year to hold the antennae. The church doesn't do anything with the antennae, they just rent out the space to hold it.

    I wish some phone company put an antennae in my chimney. I could quit working.
    • Then you could make even more money in 20 years when you and your girl become infertile and your dog only grows hair on his ass.
    • It's a transmitter! For talking to God!
    • Up here just south of Portland, OR, there's a church placed high up on a hillside along Interstate 5. When you drive up close to it, you can see that the very large cross on the front lawn actually is a tower with cell antennae on the upper part of the verticle. It really is a nice commanding view of a long stretch of heavily-travelled highway, and I'm sure the church makes out well for the placement.

    • Re:And in church steeples (Score:4, Informative)

      by victim ( 30647 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @07:46PM (#4300811)
      The Kirkwood United Methodist Church in Missouri had to take their rather massive steeple down due to rot. The church was unable to commit the resources for a replacement. AT&T had a replacement built and installed in exchange for antenna rights.

      I'd link a picture, but the web site also rotted away. Trust me, the steeple was an integral architectural element and the building looked silly without it.

      And for those worried about emissions, no need. AT&T phones barely work in the building. I suppose the antennas don't radiate down very well. Of course we are probably cooking the Christian Scientists and the Catholics next door...

  • NY can use their help.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Frank of Earth ( 126705 ) <frank&fperkins,com> on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:30PM (#4300386) Homepage Journal
    .. they decided to throw some fake looking tree branches on a HUGE tower just outside of NYC.

    Here is the article, but unfortunately I can't find a picture. Article [thejournalnews.com]

    I guess it would have slightly blended in if it wasn't 100' taller than the tallest tree.
  • What would happen if they disguise one so realistically that everyone actually gets deceived by them. Say a mast disguised as a tree, gets used by lots of birds to build their nests and eventually when some thing goes wrong and they have to repair it, what would happen to all those birds????
    Or more seriously children think of it as normal trees or street signs and play around them and knock one down. Then they will have some serious explaining to do....
  • The BIG downside to these techniques is cost. At least one network in the UK have said "no more 2G cell sites" due to cost and finite return on 2G.
    That does leave 3G antenna to mount, however they will tend to be at building level, not above and a cleaver paint job can make the antenna nearly indistinguishable from the brickwork, or concrete, behind it.
    Two tins of paint are 100 to 1000 times cheaper.
    • That would be, of course, what the website (and article) showed. Lots of building-level antennas getting a lick of paint (as well as new moulded . Not antenna towers masquerading as trees.

      anyway.

  • This has been done here in the US (Score:3, Informative)

    by teamhasnoi ( 554944 ) <teamhasnoi@CURIE ... minus physicist> on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:32PM (#4300399) Journal
    I can't find a link right now, but some Tele-company has been hiding antennas in fiberglas pine trees (in the northwest) and palm trees (in the southeast) . They aren't movie-prop quality, but chances are you wouldn't see them unless you were looking for them. They fool the wildlife at least.

    They use them in residential areas and national parks. If I find a link, I'll post it.

  • The Undetectables (flash site) (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cosyne ( 324176 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:32PM (#4300401) Homepage
    Ok, flash site is one thing. Has so many useless little files that it throws the browser into spasms where the stop button and mozilla logo blink at around 1 Hz site is a little more annoying. Perhaps their precious little flash animations don't do so well against a friday afternoon slashdotting....

  • Other options (Score:3, Informative)

    by Openadvocate ( 573093 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:35PM (#4300418)
    There are many options and it is great NOT to see these ugly antennas everywhere.
    Here is [utilitycamo.com] some examples, fake tress, a fake window, or a cross on a church tower.
  • but what's GRP?
  • If a cellular tower disguised as a tree falls in the middle of a deserted forest, does it make any noise?
  • I have seen the fake trees they have tried to use in Pacific NW, actually all the way to the Bay Area in CA, and they look pretty fugly. They jump out at you while you're driving and such. But the ones on their site were pretty impressive. I am just wondering how often they are going to have to repaint the things.

    Anyone know how well paint on GRP holds up?
    • could be worse, you could have a mayor that decides to put fake trees in the center boulevard for no apparent reason.

      butt fucking ugly, and completely non-functional metal trees.

  • Will the building's maintainers know about it? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by shess ( 31691 ) on Friday September 20, 2002 @06:50PM (#4300519) Homepage
    A couple years ago, the city I grew up in (Pipestone, MN) repainted (or otherwise maintained) their water tower. While the guys were up there, they took down some antenna, because neither they, nor anyone at city hall, could figure out why they were there.

    Turned out to be a repeater installed twenty years ago by the local radio station, with city permission.

    So now I'm imagining some roofer coming down off the roof and telling the homeowner "Uh, listen, you have a chimney up there which doesn't connect to anything. I think it might be causing your leak, do you want me to get rid of it?"
    • haha! the last place i worked we had a ee put
      mov networks on the contactors of every piece
      of equipt in the building that used mechanical
      relays.

      some time later we hired some e-lec-tric-i-ans
      to upgrade a fuse box, and they went all through
      the building stripping off the mov networks.

      when i asked what the **** they thought they were
      doing they said "aw, you don't need these
      capacitors any more, we put a new fuse box in."

      but, they were cheap.
      • It might be a funny story if I knew what the $*(#$* a MOV network was.

        But, thank you. Your story reminded me of my days of college....living in a dorm surrounded by engineering students--me the computer-graphics technology student. I never understood a word those people uttered either.

  • Will I still need to wear my tinfoil hat to defend against the mind-altering rays?
  • Where my family lives they have no cell reception. There is an old microwave tower with no dish anymore, and the local telephone company doesn't want to install cell service on the existing tower.
    I want to be buffeted by EM when I go home, damit. EM isn't just for city folks nowadays.
  • I don't know about any of you, but when I loaded up their site in Moz 1.0.1, their welcome page just flickers about 2 times per second as it tries to reload itself over and over really fast! It looks like it must be using a horrid amount of bandwidth.
    Bwahaha...

    My Moz is:
    Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.1) Gecko/20020826
  • Is it just me, or is this site absolutlely freaking out Mozilla 1.1 on Win2K, but it's OK in MSIE? IE opens the flash right away, Mozilla starts some crazy loop.

    Looks like this command:

    Is making it go berserk refreshing as fast as it can. Am I the first/only to see this?
  • seems to be putting more, small recievers on top of utility poles. Reaps several benefits, increased revenue for an already cash straped goverment, and better reception for Portland wireheads.

    Here's a quote from the Willamette Weekly, a local paper, "Health skeptics may protest, but cell-phone users may be headed toward better reception. New cell-phone towers may sprout on utility poles all over the city under a new proposal, spearheaded by Commissioner Sten's office, in which cell-phone companies would pay the city for the privilege."

    josh
    • yes, and there has never been abuse when a goverment agency become dependent on corporate cash.

      OTOH this is the same city that would run screaming if you wanted to put a 20 cent tax on gas so children can be eduacated.
  • A company named Signal Tower [signaltower.com] sells cells towers disguised as a tree. You can see pictures [signaltower.com] of this at the web site.

    P.s. sorry if this was mentioned on the site in the original story. I could not get to that site due to crap flash.

  • Not super new (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Student_Tech ( 66719 )
    I have read stories of amatuer radio operators playing games with their antennas so they would be harder to see. If QST a few years back they showed a picture of an antenna painted brown to blend in with the trees, no leaves on it however. This also reminds me of the person who used their clothesline as an antenna until the neighbor accidentally touched it while the guy was transmiting....

    • Re:Not super new (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Jonny 290 ( 260890 ) <{brojames} {at} {ductape.net}> on Friday September 20, 2002 @07:55PM (#4300860) Homepage
      I live in the bottom floor of an apartment building (my apt is actually half underground). I looked at the side of it and said, "Hey. Look at those six runs of 1.5" PVC running down the side of the building for HVAC drainage." I just bought another length of the same color and size PVC, used some brackets to bolt it to the side of the building, and put a 2m 5/8" wave and a multiband vertical VHF dipole in the top.

      I was out chatting with my landlord and watched her stare straight in that direction and not even think about it.

      Keep it QRP, though. :D
  • I have a nervous disposition to clocks (usually because I get up late). I like mobile phone masts, but hate clocks. they are an eyesore, and raise my stress levels and body temperature. As I am a member of this minority group I feel that our needs are not being met. This blatent discrimination will be taken up with the european court of human rights very shortly.

  • Good ./ing (Score:5, Funny)

    by raiyu ( 573147 ) <raiyu.raiyu@com> on Friday September 20, 2002 @07:50PM (#4300824) Homepage
    Undetectables website is now undetectable.

  • The one in NYC (Score:2, Interesting)

    by RazorRamon ( 76047 )
    If you are on I-95 in the NYC Yonkers area you'll see a cell phone tower rigged on top of a yellow brick chimney like that. I saw it a while ago and it was a wierd technology meets old-school type of feeling.
  • ...is the media-fed hysteria going around in some countries, arguing some (never proven) effects in human health. Where I live (Spain), some parents took their children away from school because there were cell masts nearby. Even after the mobile operator disconnected that base station, there were some diehards who did not allow their children go back to school -well, then it must have been antenna aestetics.

    Of course, media have never realised that there are much powerful transmitters of electromagnetic signals everywhere... starting with their very own broadcast signals.
  • I've seen plenty of antannae on the sides of existing buildings, water towers, silos, and other tall structures that were already there. Great idea. Why litter the landscape with poor camoflauge when you can just tack some gear inconspicuously on the side of something that's been there 50 years?

    Helps the the local economy too - if I were a farmer I'd take $500/month to rent the top edges of my silo. Found money, basically. And it's gotta be cheaper than construction, zoning changes, etc. that the phone company would have to shell out.
  • About two years ago, Verizon Wireless installed a cell site on top of Barton Hall on Cornell University's campus.

    Since Barton is itself a high building, the antennas are part of a cupola on one of the towers of Barton. They're using what appear to be sector antennas, one on each of the 4 sides of the cupola, painted greenish-grey to match the color of the stone the building is made out of. Impossible to notice... Especially since it's right next to a proper antenna tower with a Force 12 (http://www.force12inc.com/ C-4XLE HF tribander on top of it. :)

    People don't seem to mind the monster Force 12 on the building - Probably because it's not your usual cell tower antenna and looks quite distinctive. It actually looks quite nice when lit up at night by a light on the Barton roof. (Not sure what the light is supposed to be illuminating, but it illuminates the antenna quite well.)

    I have a picture somewhere, I'll have to dig it up and post it tonight.

Slashdot Top Deals

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny ..." -- Isaac Asimov

Close