Assuming you are one of us who longs for the cell phone service and the associated option for internet connectivity. For over a year, I have glanced up the hill at the intersection of Pixley (Rt 57) and Main Roads (Rt 23) in Monterey, only to be disappointed by what appears to be a tall silver flag pole. What is eventually going to be the first cell phone tower in Monterey has been in the works for two years, with only hearsay stories about numerous delays and no one committing to a “go live” date after the Autumn 2012 target came and went. Discovery at the Monterey Second Home Owners annual meeting in August that new building permits had been issued to AT&T, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile only heightened speculation.
Well, the past weekend, I noticed a set of mounting brackets have been installed at the top! Progress we can see! Could it be that by Columbus Day we might actually have cell phone service?
Lake Buel - A place we love 
Your an optimist Chuck
Hey Chuck I saw it too!! I’m with you Columbus Day it is!
For those of you who periodically turn on your cell phone at Lake Buel hoping to see full coverage from the new tower, it’s been a disappointing autumn. However, the project is moving forward. AT&T has installed their equipment atop the tower although they have not yet connected it to their network. (Ironically, essentially all cell phone towers in the US are hard wired into their respective networks). Barring unforeseen issues, the anticipated go live date is about a month from now. It’s been a long journey.
Yeah!
It’s live!! The AT&T antennae on the cell phone tower has been activated and coverage along Lake Buel seems to be excellent. If you have AT&T cellular service, or T-Mobile roaming, should be able to use your cell phone. Unfortunately Verizon and Sprint use a different technology and their customers will have to wait until one of those companies adds their antennae to the tower. When I spoke to the company that owns the tower last month they indicated that they very much would like to lease space on the tower to another carrier so it’s up to Verizon and/or Sprint at this point. My money would be on Verizon since the Monterey tower would provide contiguous coverage to their existing service. Anyone with Sprint roaming coverage would be able to use it as well.
By the way you can purchase what’s called a mobile hotspot through AT&T (“MiFi” unit) which creates a Wi-Fi Internet zone in your home, enabling access to the Internet through the cellular service. It operates very much like a wireless router connected to DSL or cable internet although not as fast as the latter. I got one yesterday and it will run $50 for 5GB per month. The device was free with a two-year contract. This is very helpful for those of us who weren’t able to get DSL.
Yippee
My wife and I recently bought a cottage on the beautiful lake. The first thing that I noticed last weekend (12/27/13) when arriving at the house is that I had cell service via AT&T! Hooray! My wife’s work cell (Verizon) did not have service yet. We were very happy to be connected, from a safety standpoint.