The new cell tower under construction off Old Stagecoach Road is nearly complete, according to the company that is building it.
“AT&T is in the final stages of putting their antennas up, then we will put utilities onto the site and be live. I expect AT&T to be on air in September, possibly earlier,” said Ray Vergati, site development manager for Homeland Towers, the Danbury-based company that is building the cell tower.
The cell tower stands 150 feet, plus more with whips attached. It more or less blends into a hillside full of tall trees on what had been a vacant lot.
It is a standard monopole tower, not designed to look like a water tower or pine tree, which was proposed years ago.
Like most cell tower proposals near residential areas, it had its local enemies, but, “It’s necessary to cover the dead zone at Tiger Hollow Stadium, that whole area of Ridgefield that is dead with no coverage, and other dead zones that still exist,” Vergati said.
The tower itself was erected nearly three weeks ago, ahead of schedule. It was originally anticipated to be built in August.
“The tower is up, everything else is detail,” said Dick Aarons, the town’s assistant emergency management director.
The tower is important to emergency services because it will improve emergency communications and cell phone service in many parts of northern Ridgefield. It’s also a key part of a new police-fire-town radio system voters approved in the May budget referendum.
“I think from an emergency management perspective, especially communication, it is something that is needed, has been needed for quite a few years,” First Selectman Rudy Marconi said of the tower, in an interview on the subject last summer.
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