ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, April 13, 1997 TAG: 9704140073
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHRISTINA NUCKOLS THE ROANOKE TIMES
A tower has been constructed within sight of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and demand for more in the county is only expected to increase.
Picture windows in Bob and Cheryl Clark's Hunting Hills home give the couple a panoramic view of the north sky.
This year, two new lights are visible from their family room, dining room and bedroom. The luminous smudge of the Hale-Bopp comet is beginning to fade and won't return for another 60 generations. But the other newcomer - a strobe light that glows red at night and switches to a piercing white pulse during daylight hours - will be blink, blink, blinking at the Clarks for the foreseeable future.
Publicity about the comet prepared the Clarks for Hale-Bopp, but they received no warning about the light atop Roanoke County's newest cellular tower.
"One night, I opened the drapes, and there it was," Cheryl Clark said. "We said, 'What is that?' It is very noticeable."
The tower, constructed just off Starkey Road in January, is the first in Roanoke County visible from the Blue Ridge Parkway, said Laura Rotegard, a community planner with the National Park Service.
Park Service officials aren't complaining because they know county officials were reviewing their broadcast tower ordinances when the one on Starkey Road was built. But the new tower has sped up efforts to close a loophole that allows towers in industrial and intensive commercial areas without a public hearing.
The Board of Supervisors will vote April 22 on a proposal to require permits and a public hearing for any broadcast tower constructed in the county.
The existing ordinance, adopted in 1993, requires permits only in agricultural and low-intensity commercial zoning classifications.
"In hindsight, maybe that's 'old school,''' said Terry Harrington, the county's director of planning and zoning. "Maybe we're a little more sophisticated now."
Towers are prohibited in residential areas.
John Rodman, general manager for GTE Mobilnet in Western Virginia, said his company built the tower - at an estimated cost of $800,000 to $1million - to handle customer growth in Southwest County.
"We have many customers in Hunting Hills," he said.
The Roanoke Valley's other cellular carrier, United States Cellular, is also shopping for new tower sites, and up to six new companies will be offering personal communications services, a new digital form of wireless communication.
County Attorney Paul Mahoney has estimated that the Roanoke Valley could eventually be home to 40 to 50 towers. The county has formed a committee to look for ways to minimize their impact on the region.
The committee includes representatives from local governments, cellular companies and the Western Virginia Land Trust - a new organization that encourages the use of conservation easements to preserve ridgelines and scenic areas from development.
The committee is expected to recommend changes to Roanoke County's ordinances by the end of the summer. It will have to make sure the alterations are allowed under the federal Telecommunications Act.
Passed in February 1996, the law has generated lawsuits across the country against local governments refusing to approve towers. Roanoke County already has been sued by United States Cellular for denying a tower permit last year. The case is pending in federal court.
Paul Rosa, a Maryland consultant who specializes in the aesthetics of wireless infrastructure, said the Telecommunications Act favors cellular companies. However, he said the original bill before Congress would have given those companies a blank check to build towers at will.
Rosa said Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Roanoke, was instrumental in revising the bill so that local governments had a say in tower placement.
"He's properly credited with being the point person for preserving some local control," Rosa said.
The law says cities and counties can't completely prohibit towers, nor can they discriminate between wireless companies.
Harrington said the Roanoke County committee is considering ways to encourage cellular companies to share towers or put antennas on existing structures.
In Fairfax County, a company wanting a new tower must prove that no alternatives exist. Rosa said similar ordinances could work well here.
He said the Starkey Road tower, for example, could have been avoided by placing the antenna on one of the electrical transmission towers that bisect the Hunting Hills golf course. American Electric Power has already leased space for at least one wireless antenna on a transmission tower in the Roanoke Valley.
The National Park Service has become involved in zoning revisions where the Blue Ridge Parkway could be affected, Rotegard said. Ashe County, N.C., is considering an ordinance requiring Park Service review of any tower proposed within a mile of the parkway. Asheville officials will vote this month on a proposed ban on towers within a half-mile of the parkway if they are visible to motorists.
A final issue Roanoke County's cellular committee will consider is whether cellular companies can be required to tear down existing towers when newer, less intrusive technology is available.
Harrington said such requirements are feasible because most county permits already require a review after three to five years. The prospect of not only preventing future encroachment on ridgelines but also improving scenic views has attracted the interest of other local governments in the region.
"We all know what Tinker Mountain looks like," said committee member Rupert Cutler, "and, hopefully, sometime in the future, Tinker Mountain will look better."
LENGTH: Long : 110 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: DON PETERSEN THE ROANOKE TIMES. The breathtaking viewby CNBfrom Cheryl Clark's Hunting Hills home now includes a blinking
cellular tower beacon - white during the day and red at night.
color.