By Gus Saltonstall
Sometime in the last few weeks a 32-foot 5G communications tower was installed on the Upper West Side — the first in the neighborhood.
The Link5G tower, which provides high-speed, free wifi, as well as USB charging, appeared recently on Columbus Avenue between West 94th and 95th streets.
While you still need to plug into the tower itself to charge your phone, the new taller towers differentiate from the older, smaller kiosks on city streets by offering 5G service (the kiosks only offer Wi-Fi). The taller towers deliver “enhanced mobile broadband capabilities that are up to 10 times faster than speeds currently widely available,” according to New York City’s Office of Technology and Innovation.
That city technology office began installing the towers throughout the five boroughs in 2022, but they have faced widespread pushback from residents, who complain that the design of the larger towers is “intrusive” and doesn’t easily fit into the surrounding streetscape.
Though the new tower on Columbus Avenue is the first on the Upper West Side, more than 160 of the 5G towers have been installed throughout the city so far, with around 2,000 more expected in the coming years.
The UWS tower is in front of 715 Columbus Avenue, one of five proposed sites for the 32-foot poles that West Side Rag reported on in June 2024, following a letter from City Councilmember Gale Brewer that strongly pushed back against installing any towers in the neighborhood.
Last June, though, this tower, along with a proposed location at 741 Columbus Avenue, between West 96th and 97th streets, had already been approved by the State Historic District, which has a say in the tower’s installations when they fall inside of a historic district.
As of Tuesday, there was no sign of a 5G tower at 741 Columbus Avenue or any signs that steps were being taken to prepare for an installation there. There are also no signs of a tower at the previously proposed locations at 1900 Broadway (between West 63rd and 64th streets), 1886 Broadway (between 62nd and 63rd streets), and 1880 Broadway (between 61st and 62nd streets).
A spokesperson from the Office of Technology and Innovation confirmed on Tuesday that 741 Columbus Avenue had been approved for installation for the 32-foot 5G tower, but that all three of the Broadway sites were still under review. The spokesperson added that there is no update on the timeline for when that installation on Columbus Avenue might happen, or when the review process will be completed for the Broadway locations.
“In our modern digital age, it is critical that New Yorkers have access to high-speed internet wherever they live, work, or travel across the five boroughs,” a spokesperson from the city agency previously told the Rag about the importance of the new 5G towers. “We will continue to prioritize democratizing access to technology, building a more connected and livable city for New Yorkers.”
Brewer on the other hand has not changed her stance on the towers.
“I don’t support them. I think they are not needed. Most people on the Upper West Side have internet, so I don’t agree with the notion that these will add to their capacities,” Brewer told the Rag on Tuesday. “People care about the streetscape, how things look, and that’s a very busy area between the grocery stores and general traffic, and I just don’t see the need for them.”
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They are plugg ugly; but progress?
Have you seen all the buildings in the background? It’s not exactly the prettiest part of the UWS in the first place.
They are ugly, ugly ugly!
What a monstrosity! How many of these are they thinking of putting up on the UWS? I would be HUGELY opposed to more than a few. We already have way more than enough sidewalk clutter, and now it is getting taller and taller. Do we get a say before more are put up? Will the appropriate committee of the community board have a public meeting, including a City rep ,to discuss this? Or are we simply going to be inundated with these horrible things?
BTW, I can’t be absolutely certain, but that does not look like 32 feet. If the person below it is ~6′ tall, then using that as a measure, the tower is closer to 24 feet tall – but still too big.
I think these are ugly, but they really did go through a full public process. The first ones rolled out almost three years ago now and that was a year before they were supposed to start being installed. Congressman Nadler wrote to the FCC about them and they were subject to review under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. People need to stop expecting to have a personal veto over every change to the city. We should be making it easier to try things like this not harder.
What problem does it solve? Who in the vicinity of 95th St does it help?
Many people cannot afford home service and/or find this helpful. It’s a posittjve thing for NYC to do.
So, there are many people, living/working within the 250 yard radius from this tower (probably less given the large buildings), armed with 5G-capable phones and laptops who cannot afford the readily available 5G service that comes with those devices thru at least 3 major carriers- and were just waiting/hoping that a tower would go up near them for their device to work?
5G does quite a bit more than offer phone calls.
silence
How far does the signal travel? Why another one two blocks away from this one on Columbus? How much radiation do they give off? Why aren’t any proposed north of 95th Street an area that could really use better service and free WiFi?
The intent is really to rent out the tower spaces to telecom companies. That’s how they want to make money. There are five segments in each one of the towers but the fact is the telecom companies don’t want to rent them. They’d rather put up their own stuff. So this big tower is there just broadcasting a 5G signal for one block around maybe.
I believe these are highband 5G towers and only travel 500 feet. They want to put them up everywhere. I am TOTALLY against this!
Here are the FAQ’s and the corresponding website I pulled the info from.
“It depends upon the 5G frequency in use. Low band 5G frequencies (below 2.5 GHz) can reach up to 10 miles but data bandwidth is limited. Mid-band frequencies (2.5GHz to 6GHz) handle more data but are limited in distance to a few miles if deployed on a cell tower. High band 5G is generally only deployed on small cells and can reach 500’ or less in most cases.”
https://www.steelintheair.com/5g-cell-towers-in-2024-top-questions-answered/#:~:text=Low%20band%205G%20frequencies%20(below,or%20less%20in%20most%20cases.
Gale’s right. If the countless things the City could do to improve everyday life, this would not make the list!
Now the voices make sense.
This city drives me crazy. You can’t put a chair outside a coffee shop without a permit without a special permit, but the city can just come in and put these monstrosities in our faces and outside our windows….especially if they’re in historical districts to boot.
Just (or more importantly), who’s going to be liable for the lawsuits when they admit years from now if causes cancer (and/or other things) but we forced them right outside your home???
Just wear your tinfoil hat and you’ll be fine.
Won’t somebody think of the children!
yeah, there is newly opened school right next to it
Haha!!
How insane. So ridiculous.
That’s been there for over a month and it’s ugly and stupid and useless. The five spaces where telecom companies are supposed to rent I guarantee are empty and not being rented. Just another dumb thing our dumb City Council did with no regard to real life situations.
I saw it going up. Thank goodness it’s not outside my window. I don’t recall anyone asking us? And yes – who is standing around outside looking for free WiFi?
Has nothing to do Wi-Fi
You. Better tell the author then because that’s exactly what it says
It does, but these are 5G towers. The kiosks offer Wi-Fi, but these have nothing to do with Wi-Fi.
absolutely
Well done, Gus.
US law does not permit making any health claims about the danger of 5G or other cell phone towers in legal cases to stop them from being installed. However, you can make claims that they depreciate the value of your property. Wealthy areas keep them out by asserting they lower property values but average people cannot prevent their unwanted installation claiming and demonstrating that they endanger human health.
There has been something that looks very much like this on the north side of W. 90th St. between Columbus and Amsterdam for some months now
Landmark West! has been fighting against the installation of these ugly towers since 2021. LW! has a list of proposed tower *locations* and their status (approved, withdrawn, etc) along with a history of the program here: https://www.landmarkwest.org/linknyc/
Put them in the Bronx. The outer boroughs still haven’t received the 4g towers now the 5g are being installed in Manhattan.
Hmmm. Why the Bronx
Hmmmmm. Why does Manhattan get all the free technology and nothing goes to the Bronx?? Hhhmmmmm.
One has been across E.205th St. from my building for a long time. In The Bronx.
Simple solution is to move.
they are popping in the middle of amish fields too, even though amish dont use cell phones
Great idea. Not unsughtly at all. Hope to see more of them.
Street parking is also really ugly and limits the ability to extend sidewalks and everyone seems cool with that. At least new 5G offers an alternative to Spectrum that seems to raise their rates every other month. In a year, no one will even notice the poles.
I think that these units were planned as a distraction. Complaints about their ugliness were hoped-for to divert attention from truly ugly sidewalk bridges. These units will hardly be noticeable a week after installation. They are not ugly, but merely novel. I have this advice for the complainers: Get a life.
How doed it work ? I need to stay by it and get free internet, or l can talk to my friends faster than before ? Can we not wait til we’re home and do our communication there, at home ?
You likely use it already.
How could they be planning to have THREE of these on a 3-block stretch of Broadway? I thought at first that they were considering having it in ONE of those places, but that’s not what it sounds like.
How could there be a need for so many in a tight cluster, from 61st to 64th St?
That explains why my cat has been acting weird.
This is a solution looking for a problem.
The stated benefit (free 5G) has no use case associated with it.
First of all, you need a 5G device to use it.
If you have a 5G device, you already pay for 5G service from the mobile company for service.
On the off chance that the mobile company’s 5G service is lacking in the exact location that the tower has been installed in, are you stopping next to this tower to use it?
Answer is a resouding no.
I can’t think of a situation where this service will be used.
Can you?
Think of it as a next generation 5G that provides internet speeds similar to cable internet so you can use it instead of spectrum or fios. And you don’t need your building to do any installation so you can just buy a 5G modem to support your home internet or use your phone as a hotspot.
I understand 5G internet very well. This service is provided directly to consumers in the home and on the road by Telco and internet service providers.
My point was related to the towers being installed.
There is no logical use case and hence no need for them.
In not one of the comments do or in the article do I see any reference to what these towers DO for people who already get 5G coverage on their phones. Not really clear how they benefit all but people who don’t have cell phone coverage. Who are the people who can benefit most from this. I don’t have an opinion either way re belong/don’t, ugly/innocuous, but just want to know more about what they provide/who they provide it for.
What do these cost?
Why not put them on top of buildings out of sight?
Confused. I had to look this up. The 5G part is that the towers provide space for the cell carriers to install their 5G equipment. That could lead to better cell coverage, and I hope it’s a revenue stream for the city (renting space to the carriers). Might or might not be worth the eyesore, depending on how you value the streetscape vs an improvement in cell coverage (if there is any). The public wifi and street-corner charging, which are the services the city is providing through the towers, are useless and a waste of money.
As usual, I totally disagree with Brewer. I find I seldom agree with her on anything,
NYC does bave a few toursists and out-of-towners visit. Millions
International tourism is nosediving, understandably enough.
If everything is complained about, it just becomes a whole lot of noise and not taken seriously. Maybe the public and our elected representatives need to be a little more judicious about what to complain about and what to accept and even applaud. Given that private commercial storefronts can look any way they want, and many of them don’t look very good, I don’t see these towers as eyesores. Given how slender they are, will they really be noticed in a negative way? Anyway, adding to universal wifi is a universal good, I believe, so I’m for it.
The things that piss people off…. What a world!
These 5G Towers are being installed on the sidewalks because people don’t want them on their roofs because they worried about radiation.
Please document this claim.
when I walk past i think my hearing aids (yikes, I’m dating myself) act up. thought i was hearing voices for a few weeks on my walk. flip phone was peak era of cell phones.
There was a smaller 5G tower installed last week on 70th street just west of central park west, attached to a streetlamp. It is within two blocks of a school on 68th street west of cpw. The city’s dot traffic advisory listed the street was closed for “crane operation”.
There is another 5G tower on a streetlamp on 71st st just west of cpw.
Also there is one on 74th st east of amsterdam.
There is supposed to be upcoming “crane operation” on 73rd west of columbus.
https://nylandmarks.org/news/elected-officials-demand-city-to-end-5g-tower-installations/
FYI, I took a photo of it on February 21, which I think was the day after it was installed.
Yum, more microwaves to serve man.
Yes, the Twighlight Zone reference is intentional.