I am confused by there being so many cell towers. Are some of these merely ham radio towers or are all of them mobile phone cell towers? Are some towers merely boosters aiding a larger tower? How do I find out? The site suggests ten times as many towers as I expected to find.
Hi,
Not all towers are cell towers, but it’s pretty easy to see which are cell towers from the shape of the equipment attached to them. Also, not all cellular network antennas are mounted on towers; sometimes they are mounted on rooftops, or poles supporting stadium floodlights, or on water towers.
Often more than one set of antennas are mounted on a cell tower. There might, for example, be two sets of antennas (ATT and T-Mobile).
Why are you confused? What were you expecting and why?
-Matt
Hey Matt,
Thanks to your reply. I had presumed there would be a bunch of large cell towers but judging by the map, there are hundreds or small cell towers which are hard to see.
That is it in a nutshell.
Also remember that each cell identified is not a tower but rather a single sector on a single frequency. Most cell frequencies will have 3 sectors and most towers will have multiple frequencies. So if there are 4 frequencies (or bands) then the data will look like 12 towers when in reality it is only 1 tower. This is why you will see many antennas on a tower, each serving a single frequency and single sector.