[Massplanners] [MassPlanners] Planning for Small Cell and 5G

[Jenkins, Elizabeth]

Good afternoon,

I am following up on this thread from 2020 on planning for small cell and 5G.



The Town of Barnstable is looking for examples of Wireless Facilities zoning ordinances/bylaws and/or grant of location policies, plus any design guidelines, that have been adopted by Massachusetts communities post-2018.   I would appreciate it if you would be willing to send yours to me.



If you used a consultant to prepare the ordinance/policy, could you please share that information as well?



I would be happy to compile and share a summary of responses with the group.



All the best,

Elizabeth

Elizabeth S. Jenkins, AICP | Director
Planning & Development Department
Town of Barnstable
367 Main Street, Hyannis | MA | 02601
508-862-4735






________________________________

HI Massplanners,



If you are interested, here's a link to Somerville's regulations on small cell wireless installations.  It works to follow the federal rules:

https://www.somervillema.gov/sites/default/files/standards-small-cell-wireless-facility-placement-in-public-right-of-way.pdf



George Proakis

OSPCD - City of Somerville

gproakis at somervillema.gov

________________________________

From: MassPlanners [mailto:massplanners-bounces at cs.umb.edu] On Behalf Of Matthew Dovell

Sent: Monday, February 24, 2020 10:30 AM

To: massplanners at cs.umb.edu

Subject: Re: [MassPlanners] Planning for Small Cell and 5G



Hi Doug,



I'm currently working on this a bit. To be honest I think that there's only a few places that have put any form of regulations on these, I can email you the attachments. In Mass Watertown and Burlington Ma seem to the be the only ones I've seen so far. Winchester's town manager recently submitted drafts on 5G regulations but I'm not sure if they have passed them yet.



Lindsay DeRoche (Director of the Competition Division at Dept of Telecommunications & Cable) replied to me on 11/26 regarding FCC guidelines. DCR terms can be applied to municipalities including the ten year term at the discretion of the issuing authority. FCC has stated fees are to be reasonable, non discriminatory and cost based. They can set the fees at whatever level they think is appropriate but the guidelines are $500 per application of an existing structure and $1,0000 per application for a new structure.  I don't think this provides that much in the way of room to negotiate for more fees like cable contracts.







Here is a legal opinion from a firm Farrell Fritz that talks about aesthetics and fees



https://www.lilanduseandzoning.com/2018/12/03/new-fcc-decision-tips-in-favor-of-service-providers-on-small-cell-wireless-projects/







5G is going to require many more transmitters(towers) than 4G because the signal does not go as far. Generally the signal is weaker but faster. The issues I see with 5G to be frank is that we have multiple companies with different definitions (format wars anyone?). In a sense a more rural area might transmit more of a signal vs urban but with fewer potential customers I'm sure they are doing some cost benefit analysis to determine the payoff.







Matt









Matthew Dovell MPA MCPPO

Community Planner

Berkshire Regional Planning Commission

1 Fenn St Suite 201

Pittsfield Ma 01201

Phone: 413-442-1521 ext 12

Fax: 413-442-1523

Monday to Thursday

8AM to 5PM



CAUTION:This email originated from outside of the Town of Barnstable! Do not click links, open attachments or reply, unless you recognize the sender's email address and know the content is safe!
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